A crypto payment gateway processing over 30 million transactions monthly just removed the two biggest barriers that keep businesses from paying people in crypto: fees and complexity.
NOWPayments launched a new payout infrastructure on Monday, built on custody technology and integrated with ChangeNOW Pro wallets. The system enables crypto payouts via email with settlement speeds of up to one second and zero service or network fees within the NOWPayments ecosystem.
The recipient doesn’t need a crypto wallet. They don’t need to understand blockchain. They don’t need to write down a seed phrase or configure a gas fee. They receive an email with a secure payout link. They click it. A ChangeNOW Pro ecosystem wallet is automatically created. The funds appear instantly.
That’s it. From the sender’s perspective, paying someone in crypto now works like sending a PayPal transfer. From the recipient’s perspective, receiving crypto now works like opening an email attachment. The entire process that used to require wallet setup, address verification, network selection, and fee calculation has been compressed into a single click.
For an industry that has spent years talking about mainstream crypto adoption, this is what it actually looks like when someone builds it.
How the System Works
The payout infrastructure builds on NOWPayments’ existing Mass Payouts product, which businesses already use for large-scale crypto transfers through CSV file uploads and API integrations. The new layer adds three capabilities that didn’t exist before.
Zero fees within the ecosystem. When both sender and recipient operate within the NOWPayments and ChangeNOW Pro infrastructure, the transaction settles internally without hitting the blockchain. No network fees. No service charges. No gas costs. The payout moves between custody wallets within the same system, similar to how an internal bank transfer between two accounts at the same bank incurs no fee.
One-second settlement. Because the transaction doesn’t need to be confirmed on a blockchain, it settles almost instantly. There’s no waiting for block confirmations. No mempool congestion. No variable confirmation times depending on network load. The funds are available in the recipient’s wallet within approximately 1 second after the sender initiates the payout.
Email-based delivery. The sender enters the recipient’s email address instead of a wallet address. The system generates a secure link, sends it via email, and automatically creates a ChangeNOW Pro wallet for the recipient if they don’t already have one. The wallet is accessible immediately with no KYC friction for receiving funds.
The combination eliminates the three friction points that have historically made crypto payouts impractical for mainstream businesses: cost (fees eat into margins on small payments), speed (blockchain confirmations create delays), and complexity (recipients need technical knowledge to receive crypto).
Who This Is Built For
NOWPayments isn’t targeting individual users sending money to friends. The new infrastructure is designed for businesses processing high volumes of payments to large numbers of recipients.
The company highlighted several use cases in which the system solves real operational problems.
Affiliate networks and marketing platforms that pay thousands of publishers, influencers, and content creators on a regular basis. Traditional payout methods through banks involve high per-transaction fees, currency conversion costs, and settlement delays of three to five business days. Crypto payouts through the new system cost nothing and settle instantly, regardless of the recipientis country.
Freelance marketplaces and gig economy platforms that need to pay workers across dozens of countries. Cross-border bank transfers cost $15 to $50 each and take days. Crypto payouts through NOWPayments cost zero and take one second. For a platform paying 10,000 freelancers monthly, the savings on fees alone can reach six figures annually.
Gaming platforms and digital content ecosystems that distribute micro-payments to creators. When individual payouts are $5 or $10, traditional payment processing fees can consume 5% to 15% of the amount. Zero-fee crypto payouts make micro-payments economically viable for the first time.
NOWPayments estimates that enterprises processing 10,000+ monthly payouts can reduce operational overhead by up to 70% by switching to the new infrastructure. That figure accounts for eliminating transaction fees, reducing treasury management complexity, and removing the onboarding friction that currently slows down payout operations.
The Business Model Behind Zero Fees
Free products in fintech always raise the same question: if the service is free, how does the company make money?
NOWPayments CEO Kate Lifshits addressed this directly in the launch announcement. “We believe payout providers should stop making money only from their partners,” she said. “For too long, businesses accepted payout fees as the price of moving money. We’re introducing a different approach, one where partners can earn together with NOWPayments while benefiting from faster infrastructure and zero-fee transfers.”
The revenue model shifts from per-transaction fees to ecosystem participation. Businesses that use NOWPayments’ custody infrastructure become part of a network where the value comes from volume, data, and adjacent services rather than from charging a fee on each individual payment. Currency conversion, premium features, and enterprise-level treasury tools generate revenue without taxing the basic payout function.
The model mirrors what PayPal, Cash App, and Venmo have done in traditional payments. The core transfer function is free or nearly free. Revenue comes from the ecosystem of services built around that function: merchant processing, currency exchange, premium accounts, and lending products.
For NOWPayments, the zero-fee payout is the hook that brings businesses onto the platform. Once they’re processing payouts through the ecosystem, the company monetizes through the broader suite of services that those businesses eventually need.
The Scale Behind the Platform
NOWPayments isn’t a startup making promises. The company’s operational scale lends credibility to the new product launch.
The platform processes over 30 million transactions monthly across its payment gateway, invoicing, and payout products. Lifetime transaction volume has exceeded $10 billion. The company supports more than 350 cryptocurrencies and 30+ stablecoins across Ethereum, Tron, Solana, Polygon, BNB Chain, and other networks.
Those numbers place NOWPayments among the larger crypto payment processors globally, behind BitPay and Coinbase Commerce, but ahead of most other independent providers. The existing transaction volume means the new payout infrastructure launches into an active ecosystem rather than starting from zero.
The Mass Payouts feature that the new system builds on already handles large-scale distributions through CSV and API integrations. Adding zero-fee email-based delivery extends the reach to recipients who aren’t technically sophisticated enough to provide a wallet address, which is most people outside the crypto community.
For a company processing 30 million transactions per month, the marginal cost of processing internal ecosystem transfers at a zero fee is minimal. The infrastructure already exists. The custody wallets already operate. The compliance systems are already running. Adding zero-fee internal settlement is an extension of existing capability, not a new build.
Where This Fits in the Broader Payments Landscape
NOWPayments’ launch arrives during the most competitive week in crypto payments history.
SoFi launched the first bank-issued stablecoin inside a consumer app. Cash App rolled out USDC to 60 million users with zero transfer fees. Mastercard secured a BitLicense for stablecoin settlement. Binance launched stock trading alongside tokenised bStocks. Visa’s stablecoin settlement programme continues expanding globally.
Each of these products solves a different piece of the crypto payments puzzle. SoFi and Cash App address consumer-to-consumer transfers. Visa and Mastercard handle merchant settlement. Binance bridges crypto and equities.
NOWPayments fills a gap that none of those products address directly: business-to-individual payouts at scale. When a company needs to pay 10,000 affiliate partners, 50,000 gig workers, or 100,000 content creators across dozens of countries, consumer payment apps and card settlement networks aren’t the right tool.
The payout market is enormous and largely unserved by crypto. Global cross-border B2B payments total over $150 trillion annually. Even capturing a tiny fraction of that market through faster, cheaper infrastructure represents a significant business opportunity.
NOWPayments isn’t going after the entire $150 trillion. It’s going after the long tail: the millions of small and medium businesses that need to pay people internationally but can’t afford the fees and delays of traditional banking. For those businesses, zero-fee crypto payouts that settle in one second and require nothing of the recipient other than an email address represent a genuinely better alternative to what exists today.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Cryptocurrency investments carry significant risk. Always conduct your own research before making any investment decisions.
