PayPal payments and notifications are coming to Facebook Messenger, offering users more options for easy and secure online transactions.
Facebook Messenger has been allowing debit card payments so far, but adding PayPal support takes things to the next level for both parties involved.
For Facebook, it goes a long way toward proving that Messenger can function as a fully fledged service on its own. For PayPal, it's a vast pool of 1.7 billion users that could become frequent customers.
PayPal has been making efforts to expand more into the consumer realm for a good while now. It teamed up with Visa, MasterCard, Claro, Vodafone, Telcel and Alibaba recently to widen its reach, and Facebook Messenger is no small addition to its partner list.
Facebook has also been making efforts to push Messenger into a full platform rather than just another messaging app. Facebook Messenger has become increasingly better and more versatile, gaining popularity and adding more options to keep users engaged.
The new PayPal payments and notifications feature is now rolling out to users in the United States first, but a wider rollout is expected in the near future. For now, existing PayPal users who also communicate via Messenger will have a new option to link their PayPal and Messenger accounts for easy payments. At the same time, users will also get PayPal payment notifications straight within the Messenger app, without having to open a separate app or website.
This makes things significantly easier for those who want to make payments via Facebook Messenger and PayPal, and also adds to Messenger's push to become more of a commerce tool.
"Mobile commerce continues to evolve, offering opportunities for next-generation shopping experiences that are more frictionless and relevant than ever before," says PayPal.
"To continue ushering in this new commerce paradigm, today we are announcing an extension of our relationship with Facebook and Messenger, to help make mobile commerce smarter, simpler and more secure for consumers as well as merchants."
The new partnership between Facebook and PayPal means that merchants will be able to connect more easily with the 192 million active PayPal users worldwide and, as Facebook Messenger starts pushing native payments, merchants will be able to take PayPal payments straight within their bots.
PayPal makes no mention at this point of when the new feature will roll out to Facebook Messenger users around the world, but for now U.S. users should start seeing the option soon enough. More details regarding a global rollout should surface shortly and we'll keep you up to date as soon as we learn more.
