The report examined the behavior patterns of active users on 14 digital payment platforms, which are currently dominated by OVO as the clear leader, followed by GoPay, ShopeePay, and DANA users.

The survey found that over the last 3 months, 44% of the respondents used these platforms to make online digital payments at least 4 times a week to carry out 5 types of online transactions (telephone credit, food order, online shopping, bills payment and transportation), as well as making offline transactions at 1-2 merchants each week.

These results reflect the changes in Indonesian consumers’ behavior triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic, as the public has shifted to adopt digital behaviors including digital transactions and digital payments. According to the Indonesian central bank, e-money transactions rose from IDR 145 trillion (est USD 70 million) in 2019 to IDR 205 trillion (est USD 143.5 million) in 2020. Indonesia is the world’s fourth most populous country and Southeast Asia’s largest economy.

Sebastian, Kadence Quantitative Director, said, “It is apparent that digital payment has accelerated in Indonesia in line with the growing digital economy, and that consumers in major urban cities are becoming increasingly digital-savvy.”

Brand awareness was highest for OVO with 96% of the Kadence survey respondents mentioning that they are familiar with OVO, followed by 95% for GoPay, 93% for DANA and 81% for ShopeePay.

Mirroring brand awareness patterns, active usage was highest for OVO with 71% with GoPay second at 64%. However, ShopeePay trumped DANA in terms of active users, with 57% of users stating they had actively used ShopeePay compared to 46% for DANA, despite brand awareness being greater for the latter.

OVO led in online and offline transactions generally, which may be attributed to its open ecosystem strategy and positioning as a universal digital payment platform. Reasons for choosing OVO included ease of use of the application, perceived security and confidentiality, and being highly recommended by many people, as well as ability to earn loyalty points.

For example, OVO led in both online food orders as well as traditional food stall purchases (offline transaction) with 81% of OVO respondents ordering online food online and 38% of OVO users using OVO to make traditional food stall purchases.

GoPay was a tight second for online food orders with 75% of its respondents using the platform for online food orders, while for traditional food stall purchases, DANA users showed the second highest level of activity with 36% of DANA respondents saying that they had used the platform to make purchases at traditional food stalls.

However, ShopeePay was favored by respondents for e-commerce transactions, citing low top-up costs and numerous attractive promotions related to for daily necessities such as household appliances, personal necessities, health care products and electronic goods available for purchase on the Shopee e-commerce platform, which is the parent company for ShopeePay.

In terms of users, compared to other digital payments, OVO was the choice for users of productive age (25-45 years) of all genders with an almost equal composition, namely 51% male and 49% female. DANA users also showed balanced composition with a ratio of 55% male and 45% female. Meanwhile, GoPay and ShopeePay were preferred by respondents in the 18-24 year age group. GoPay users were dominated by men, while ShopeePay users were dominated by women.
Lastly, given that digital financial services are a fast growing market, the Kadence survey looked at awareness of financial services on these digital payment platforms.

OVO, which bills itself as a digital payment and financial services provider, recorded the highest score for financial services generally, with 63% of respondents saying they were familiar with the investment feature in OVO and 44% of them having used the feature. Meanwhile, PayLater feature awareness was highest for ShopeePay and GoPay, at 59% for ShopeePay and at
58% for GoPay.