Jakarta. Indonesia and India are in “very advanced” talks about connecting their QR payment systems by the end of the year.

President Prabowo Subianto and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi set high hopes for this cooperation as the latter made his first trip to Indonesia since 2023 on Tuesday. To the press, Prabowo revealed that discussions on connecting the country’s respective QR payment systems had been “progressing”.

“This partnership is expected to boost transaction efficiency, while making our financial sector more resilient,” Prabowo said, shortly after the meeting.

Modi expects the cross-border linkage to “improve ease of doing business and make traveling more convenient”. 

Indonesia’s QRIS system lets people pay simply by scanning QR codes. The same goes for Indians and their Unified Payments Interface (UPI). The upcoming integration will enable tourists to pay in their respective currencies: rupiah or rupees.

Neither leader mentioned any target for when they expect the QR payment integration to go live. 

Indian Ambassador to Indonesia Sandeep Chakravorty told a separate news briefing that night that the payment linkage was a “work in progress at a very advanced stage”. Prabowo-Modi’s interest in having the system operational soon has also sent a “message” to the negotiators to quickly conclude the talks, according to Chakravorty.

“I’m hopeful we will find the QRIS-UPI integration by the end of the year,” he said.

Jakarta has made its QRIS payments available in several countries, the most recent one being China. Indonesians can also already make cashless transactions via QRIS when traveling in Malaysia, Thailand, and Singapore.

Indians made up the third-largest bulk of foreign visitors in Indonesia from January to May 2026. The country recorded 222,470 arrivals from Indian passport holders. Australia (646,131) and China (243,389) topped the ranking.

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