UPI-Qatar

Overview

The UPI-Qatar Linkage is a cross-border merchant-acceptance arrangement enabling Indian travellers to pay merchants in Qatar with their Unified Payments Interface (UPI) apps. It is operated by NPCI International Payments Limited (NIPL) in partnership with Qatar National Bank (QNB) — the largest bank in the Middle East and Africa — which became the first bank in Qatar to enable UPI acceptance for the merchants it acquires [1][2]. The model is QR-code-based person-to-merchant (P2M) acceptance across QNB's merchant ecosystem, technically powered by the Japanese payment gateway provider NETSTARS [1]. Within the corpus, Qatar's national report documents QNB's dominance and the Qatar Mobile Payment (QMP) national system [[../countries/QA-qatar.md]], while India's report documents UPI as the dominant NPCI-operated retail rail [[../countries/IN-india.md]].

History

The partnership between NIPL and QNB was announced on 25 February 2025, making QNB the first bank in Qatar to enable QR-based UPI acceptance for its acquired merchants [2]. The corridor went live in commercial use in September 2025, with Qatar Duty Free at Hamad International Airport becoming the first live merchant to accept UPI [1]. NIPL CEO Ritesh Shukla cast the deal within NIPL's aim to enhance UPI acceptance globally and create a truly interoperable global payment network [1].

Technical specification

Linkage model. A one-directional merchant-acceptance linkage. An Indian traveller uses a UPI app to make QR-code-based P2M payments at merchants acquired by QNB; the acceptance is delivered through point-of-sale terminals powered by NETSTARS' payment solution [1].

Direction supported. Outbound from India only — Indian UPI users pay Qatari (QNB-acquired) merchants. This is a tourist-acceptance corridor, not a bidirectional account-to-account remittance linkage [1][2].

Coverage. Acceptance is intended to span the QNB payment ecosystem, including the airport, hotels, tourist attractions, restaurants, and retail outlets [2].

Currency / limits. FX mechanics and per-transaction caps were not specified in the fetched sources [1][2].

Inbound RuPay issuance. Not applicable — the Qatar corridor is pure UPI acceptance through QNB-acquired merchants and does not include local RuPay card issuance [1][2].

Use cases

• Tourist merchant payments. Indians are the second-largest group of international visitors to Qatar, and the corridor lets them transact in real time across QNB-acquired merchants — airport, hotels, attractions, restaurants, and retail — without carrying cash or relying on currency exchange [2].
• Airport retail. The launch use case is duty-free shopping at Qatar Duty Free, Hamad International Airport [1].
• Merchant volume growth. QNB expects the service to lift transaction volumes for its acquired merchants and support Qatar's retail and tourism sectors [2].

Implementations

The Indian side uses standard UPI apps. The Qatari side is enabled by QNB as acquirer, with NETSTARS providing the underlying payment gateway/POS solution [1]. The first live merchant is Qatar Duty Free at Hamad International Airport, with planned extension across the QNB merchant network [1][2]. QNB is described as the largest bank in the Middle East and Africa, giving the corridor broad domestic acquiring reach [2][[../countries/QA-qatar.md]].

Comparison

UPI-Qatar is a one-way tourist merchant-acceptance corridor, contrasting with the upi-paynow template's bidirectional account-to-account remittance design [1][[../standards/upi-paynow.md]]. It is structurally closest to the Nepal and France corridors — unidirectional, P2M-QR, no RuPay issuance — and unlike the bidirectional, RuPay-issuing Mauritius linkage. A distinguishing feature is that acceptance rides on a single commercial acquirer (QNB) plus a third-party gateway (NETSTARS), rather than a national payment network like Nepal's Fonepay or a national QR scheme; coverage is therefore bounded by QNB's merchant base. Against the multilateral nexus hub, Qatar is a standalone bilateral acceptance arrangement and does not settle through a shared instant-payment switch; Qatar's own national instant rail is the separate QMP system [[../countries/QA-qatar.md]].

Fun facts

• The first live UPI merchant in Qatar was Qatar Duty Free at Hamad International Airport [1].
• The corridor's acceptance technology is supplied by a Japanese gateway provider, NETSTARS, illustrating the multi-country supply chain behind UPI's international acceptance [1].

Status

Live (early). The NIPL-QNB partnership was announced on 25 February 2025 and the first merchant (Qatar Duty Free) went live in September 2025, with rollout across the QNB merchant ecosystem in progress [1][2]. Specific corridor transaction volumes were not disclosed in the fetched sources [1].

Sources

1 Qatar now accepts UPI payments, Qatar Duty Free becomes first merchant — Travel Trade Journal, 2025 2 NPCI enables UPI acceptance across Qatar in tie-up with Qatar National Bank — The Hans India, 2025

Deployments

No country reports mention this standard by name.

Regions / aggregations not mapped to a single country

• India–Qatar