Skip to main content

NFC travel tickets set for rapid growth

A new report from Juniper Research has found that 13 per cent of North American and Western European mobile users will use their NFC-enabled mobile phone as a metro rail or bus ticket by 2016, compared with less than one per cent today.
March 13, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
A new report from 7194 Juniper Research has found that 13 per cent of North American and Western European mobile users will use their NFC-enabled mobile phone as a metro rail or bus ticket by 2016, compared with less than one per cent today. Worldwide, mobile users are now beginning to adopt mobile tickets as an integrated part of their mobile lifestyle, whether for airline, road or rail transport, sporting or entertainment event access.

The report found that, while mobile tickets of all types are growing in popularity, the ability to tap an NFC phone containing a mobile ticket against an entrance gate has tremendous user appeal. For operators, a mobile phone ticket also provides new marketing and sales opportunities previously not available using paper or contactless smartcard tickets.

"NFC mobile ticketing is still in its early stages, but it holds great promise across the entire mobile ticketing market,” said report author David Snow. “Metro ticketing is leading the way as an NFC ticket is a natural evolution from a contactless transport card and can leverage the existing infrastructure.  Add to this the option of simultaneous payment and you have created a compelling user experience.”

Other findings from the report predict that worldwide mobile ticketing transactions are set to quadruple to 23 billion by 2016, while by by 2016, NFC mobile tickets will represent more than 50 per cent of all mobile ticketing revenue.

The Mobile Ticketing whitepaper is available to download from the Juniper website together with further details of the study ‘Mobile Ticketing Evolution: NFC, Forecasts & Markets 2012-2016’.

Related Content

  • November 18, 2013
    Eurosmart: nearly one billion contactless smartcards shipped in 2013
    The global desire for solutions which combine convenience and security shows absolutely no sign of stopping, according to Eurosmart, the acknowledged voice of the smart security industry Revealing some dramatic figures at the opening of CARTES 2013 today, Eurosmart estimates that 7.2 billion Smart Secure Devices will be shipped by the end of this year, with that number growing by 7% to more 7.7 billion units in 2014.
  • December 7, 2012
    Helsinki commuters use RFID to buy tickets, post messages
    By tapping a Near Field Communication (NFC)-enabled phone against the tags installed at 211 tram stops, passengers nine transit lines operated by Helsinki Region Transport (HRT) can now use their NFC-enabled mobile phones to not only pay for tickets, but also to upload and view comments on Helsinki Region Transport's online message wall. Helsinki Region Transport already enables commuters to purchase tickets using their mobile phones. Travellers can simply input an SMS code and send it as a text message in
  • January 25, 2012
    Smartphone - the next technology for charging and tolling?
    With all the debates over the most suitable future technology or technologies for charging and tolling, is it not time for the industry to look at what the rest of ITS is doing and bring a rank outsider - the smart phone - closer into the fold? By Jack Opiola, D'Artagnan Consulting LLC
  • February 6, 2014
    Contactless tickets forecast to reach 1.7 billion in 2018
    ABI Research has forecast that a combination of memory and microcontroller smart cards alongside disposable ticketing solutions will reach shipments totalling 1.7 billion units in 2018. The primary drivers include the increasing move to national standards and the enablement of near field communications (NFC) and open-loop payments. This trend is a consistent feature across all continents with particular progress within the UK, US, Australia, Germany, Turkey, and the BRIC countries forming a growth engine