How Cashfree Payments Is Unlocking India’s Cross-Border Ecommerce Growth

From viral TIRTIR foundations, a Korean make-up product, to Nike Air Force 1 shoes and Karl Lagerfeld luxury bags, global brands have never failed to fascinate Indian consumers. Yet, making an international purchase online often proves messy, as transactions drag, checkouts falter and hidden fees pile up. 

In simple terms, India’s cross-border ecommerce is exploding. Aspirational buyers are reaching beyond domestic platforms for luxury and practical goods — from apparel and accessories to electronics and beauty. 

A Meta-commissioned Kantar study found that nearly half of India’s online shoppers bought something from overseas in the past six months. And this demand is no longer confined to metros. Tier II and III cities are joining in, led by millennials and Gen Z, who see the world as their shopping mall. 

But here’s the catch. Checkout hasn’t kept pace. The friction points — frequent payment failures and tentative pricing due to currency fluctuations — are slowing an otherwise booming trend. What’s missing is a hassle-free, localised way to pay and streamlined operations.

This is the gap Bangalore-based Cashfree Payments is trying to solve. In 2024, the fintech giant rolled out its Payment Gateway (PG) for International Merchants to empower global merchants to sell into India. Built under the RBI’s Payment Aggregator Cross Border (PA-CB) Imports framework, it is the first licensed solution that enables global merchants to collect INR payments through India’s most preferred local payment methods, without needing to establish an Indian presence. These payments are then settled directly into the merchant’s overseas account, in a compliant and streamlined manner. What powers this seamless experience is Cashfree’s robust stack that includes automated invoice verification, direct onboarding of foreign entities, and a checkout experience tailored for Indian consumers.

The timing is significant. India’s e-commerce market is projected to reach $400 billion by FY30, with cross-border orders accounting for a significant share. According to Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence (PCMI), cross-border ecommerce accounted for approximately 10% of India’s total ecommerce market as of 2024. 

Faster shipping and stronger logistics also allow for quick delivery. Online payments, however, remain the weakest link in this chain. 

Consider this: most Indian shoppers rely on credit cards for international transactions, but payments often fail at checkout. Hidden costs from foreign exchange (FX) markups or unexpected fees can create unpleasant surprises for customers. In a price-sensitive market like India, even small variations are enough to push shoppers away from global brands. For merchants, abandoned carts, transaction failures, and unexpected chargebacks turn cross-border sales into a significant challenge.

This is precisely the space Cashfree wants to own. Its pitch is simple: Rebuild trust among shoppers by making payments transparent and frictionless. With UPI-first checkouts, it is giving Indian shoppers a familiar, reliable way to pay. The goal is thereby to reduce cart abandonments and lead to a boost in sales for global merchants.

But there’s more to it than payment hurdles. Overseas sellers also run into India’s complex compliance landscape. To begin with, all cross-border transactions must be routed through RBI-authorised channels. Merchants are expected to follow the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA), calculate Integrated GST on imports, handle customs duties, meet data protection requirements and carry out Know Your Customer/Anti-Money Laundering checks.

Cashfree’s PG for International Merchants bridges these gaps as well, helping with end-to-end compliance within the RBI guardrails. To support merchants across geographies, the platform is designed for asynchronous operations. Time stamps and reconciliations adjust automatically to merchant and customer locations, avoiding the need for Indian working hours alignment. In fact, settlement updates, support responses, and payment notifications are all standardised for global time zone flexibility. If it succeeds, the story won’t just be about one fintech. It will mark a bigger shift — where UPI, once built to digitalise domestic payments, starts powering a new wave of global ecommerce.

Making Cross-Border Selling As Simple As Next-Door Commerce

The big difference is how transactions are routed. While most global gateways lean on international card networks — where transactions done in India often fail by 35-40% — Cashfree is enabling global merchants to accept payments in INR via India’s most trusted methods such as UPI, bank transfer, Rupay cards, Mastercard, and Visa. It also manages regulatory compliance behind the scenes, making selling in India as effortless as selling next door.

For shoppers, this ecosystem means paying how they always do, without hidden fees and clunky processes. All transactions are FEMA- and RBI-compliant, with FX rates shown upfront for pricing transparency. 

The fintech giant onboards foreign entities directly, without requiring them to set up India units and procure the licences required. It means merchants can quickly access domestic payment modes and receive settlements straight into overseas bank accounts. Cashfree says merchants can go live within days, accessing a massive customer base and benefiting from fewer lost sales due to a huge checkout success. 

“Businesses who use our PG for International Merchants have seen checkout success rates jump to more than 85%, compared to 60-65% on international card rails,” said Akash Sinha, cofounder and CEO of Cashfree Payments.

It is designed with merchants in mind. Unlike global payment service providers that charge fees on every dispute, Cashfree absorbs chargeback dispute costs, helping protect margins in a market where razor-thin unit economics are often the difference between scaling and stalling.

Another key feature is its AI-powered invoice verification. It auto-approves 98% of transactions within two minutes, a big leap from the manual checks that used to delay settlements for days. Shrinking this timeframe could make a tangible difference in merchant cash flow. 

A Deep Dive Into The Success Stories of Cashfree’s PG for International Merchants 

“Think of Indian parents buying British formula milk online from a UK store and paying with UPI. No currency confusion, no failed payments. Integrating with Cashfree finally lets us serve that demand without friction. For us, it felt like a big bang moment,” said Amit Patel, cofounder of Style Dotty, a cross-border ecommerce marketplace. 

This seamlessness is what Cashfree is pitching, and several global brands are living that experience. They now treat Indian shoppers as confident buyers who expect global checkouts to work as smoothly as local ones.

Many think this opportunity will expand beyond India. For instance, 8B, a technology platform that streamlines cross-border payments pointed to a bigger regional impact.

“Ecommerce in Central Asia is at an inflexion point, but rising economies remain under-connected to global payment networks,” said an 8B spokesperson. “Conversely, India has built a world-class fintech engine anchored by UPI. We can link that infrastructure with emerging markets to enable global payments and build genuine economic connections.”

Even regulation and compliance — once a barrier to entry — are now becoming bridges. “Entering a new market means regulatory and operational hurdles,” said Shobhit Mehra, founder and CEO of BoxPay, a cloud-based payments management platform. “But with Cashfree, we have eliminated those barriers for India. Together, we ensure that BoxPay merchants can expand confidently, compliantly and at scale.”

The bigger story reflects a significant shift in consumer mindset. Indian shoppers no longer see themselves as outsiders to global ecommerce. They want prices in INR, trusted methods like UPI and complete price transparency before hitting the ‘buy’ button. As for merchants, the competitive edge in a fast-evolving Indian market will come not from reach but from experience.

For now, the message from the B2B users of Cashfree’s PG for International Merchants is clear. Cross-border ecommerce is reshaping how consumers access global goods and how merchants plan their international expansion. More importantly, India is not just dipping its toes into cross-border shopping. Fintech innovators like Cashfree are aligning technology, trust and compliance to set the pace for global commerce growth and make this transformation sustainable. 

Global Ecommerce Is Exploding; Will India Lead The Charge? 

Ecommerce is no longer just a convenience. It is becoming a global stage where borders matter less than a strong internet connection and a good checkout experience. By 2030, global ecommerce is projected to hit $5 Tn in terms of revenue, up from $3.7 Tn in 2025. Cross-border B2C ecommerce will follow a similar trajectory.

India is riding this wave too. Its cross-border ecommerce market could surpass $753 Bn by 2033, growing from $169.3 Bn in 2025. This surge is powered by large-scale online shopping adoption, affordable global logistics, and a new wave of direct-to-consumer brands reaching buyers.

In fact, the story is particularly vibrant in India. High-growth ecommerce startups raised $1.5 Bn in 2024, underscoring a fast-growing consumer market and an emerging hub for innovation. From smaller cities embracing digital-first retail to homegrown brands thinking global, India is shaping how the next decade of commerce will look.

However, the ecommerce narrative is bigger than its topline growth. Today, a shopper in Indore expects the same variety as someone in New York or London. As borders blur, markets connect faster, with access and choice emerging as the new currency.

Given that scenario, eliminating payment friction and connecting India’s advanced fintech infrastructure with the global ecommerce ecosystem to access a diversified market cannot be delayed. Cashfree’s PG for International Merchants pioneers that vision, making overseas transactions seamless and helping businesses compete on an equal footing worldwide.