CUPERTINO, Calif.—People search for Bitcoin more often than they do Apple Pay, according to Google Trends.
That’s according to The Merkle, a website that covers the cryptocurrency market, noting that both payment options are either direct competitors of each other or future partners.
It may be early to stack up Google Trends results for both Bitcoin and Apple Pay due to the fact Bitcoin has been around for more than six years, while Apple Pay has been in play just over a year.
The Merkle noted that Bitcoin does not suffer from the “drawbacks” that affect Apple Pay, such as needing to sign agreements with card issuers and having to be used in store at NFC-capable terminals.
“The digital currency operates outside of the realm of banks and authorities. But at the same time, this is also a factor which instills doubt into the minds of businesses and consumers, as there would be no one to ‘bail them out’ if things went awry,” the news outlet stated.
But Bitcoin adoption is going well on the merchant side, although most of the focus lies in online payments. As far as in-store acceptance is concerned, very few stores accept Bitcoin payments right now, even though there is no additional cost involved to enable these payments. All a merchant needs is an Internet connection and either a computer or mobile device to generate Bitcoin invoices.
The majority of Bitcoin searches are originating from outside the U.S., noted the news outlet. Bitcoin searches on Google are coming from emerging markets where financial services are hard to come by. In the top five locations for Bitcoin searches are the Bahamas, Slovenia, and Ghana.
And when it comes to overall payments searchers on Google, PayPal remains the clear leader, The Merkle reported.