How do Brazilians pay online?
Pix is the default. The Central Bank’s instant payment system settles in seconds, runs around the clock and costs merchants less than card acquiring. In 2025 it handled nearly 80 billion transactions worth more than R$35 trillion, 25.7% more transactions than in 2024, and 43% of them were payments from people to businesses. In December 2025 alone, 148 million people made or received a Pix. For a typical e-commerce checkout it is the first method shoppers look for.
Pix now handles recurring billing too. Pix Automático went live on 16 June 2025: the customer authorises a merchant once, and later charges for bills, tuition or subscriptions are debited without approving each one. Use is still small but growing fast, with almost 600,000 transactions worth R$133.2 million in December 2025, more than double the previous month.
Cards still matter. Credit cards took 40% of e-commerce value in 2025, close behind Pix at 42%, according to the Global Payments Report by Worldpay and Global Payments. Card payments in Brazil reached R$4.5 trillion in 2025 according to the card industry association Abecs, with credit cards at R$3.1 trillion, up 14.5%. Visa and Mastercard dominate issuing, and the local schemes Elo and Hipercard add meaningful volume, especially among domestic shoppers. Brazilian consumers are used to paying in interest-free instalments (parcelado), so a checkout that cannot offer instalments loses baskets above a few hundred reais.
Boleto bancário is declining but not gone. It still serves shoppers without cards or digital banking, with a settlement delay of one to three business days.
What rules shape online payments in Brazil?
Online shoppers can change their minds. Article 49 of the Consumer Defence Code (Law 8.078/1990) gives consumers seven days from signing or from receiving the product to cancel any purchase made outside a physical store, and any amount paid must be returned immediately, adjusted for inflation. Decree 7.962/2013 applies this to e-commerce: the merchant must explain clearly how to cancel, accept the request through the same channel used to buy, confirm it at once, and tell the card issuer immediately so the charge is either kept off the bill or reversed.
Cross-border card spending is taxed. Brazilian cardholders pay IOF, a federal tax on foreign exchange, when they buy in a foreign currency. Decree 12.466 raised the rate on credit, debit and prepaid card purchases abroad from 3.38% to 3.5% from 23 May 2025, Decree 12.499 kept that rate in June 2025, and after Congress tried to suspend the increase, the Supreme Federal Court reinstated it in July 2025.
Imported goods follow the Remessa Conforme programme. The Receita Federal certifies e-commerce sites that collect import taxes at checkout, so the parcel is not taxed again on arrival. Since mid-May 2026, under Provisional Measure 1.357/2026, purchases of up to US$50 by individuals from certified sites pay no federal import tax, replacing the 20% rate introduced in 2024; Congress approved the measure in September 2026. State ICMS of 17% to 20% still applies, larger orders pay 60% import tax less a US$30 discount, and parcels from sites outside the programme pay 60% with no discount.
Customer data is covered by the LGPD (Law 13.709/2018). Personal data may only be transferred abroad under the conditions the law sets, such as adequacy or standard contractual clauses, and fines can reach 2% of Brazilian revenue, capped at R$50 million per infringement. On the payment side, Pix has no card-style chargeback; its Special Return Mechanism (MED) lets a payer’s bank block funds and request their return in proven cases of fraud or scams, and since October 2025 customers can open a claim directly in their banking app.
How does Omno route payments in Brazil?
Omno treats Brazil as a multi-provider market. You connect once and configure routing rules per method, currency and customer group:
- Pix pay-ins go to the provider your rule sets for that customer segment, with cascading to the next Pix provider in the rule if one is unavailable or rejects the request.
- Pix payouts follow PSP eligibility rules, so marketplace seller payouts only use providers that support name-matched Pix transfers to the recipient.
- Cards can be routed by BIN to the acquirer your rule sets for that issuer, with instalment plans passed through where the provider supports them.
- Webhooks report the final status of every transaction, which is the record your back office should trust for fulfilment.
Customer groups and customer verification levels let you keep new customers on conservative routes and limits, then open more providers as trust grows.
What should merchants plan for?
Plan for the seven-day cancellation right. Build a refund flow that returns card payments through the issuer and Pix payments to the payer’s account, and keep confirmation records for every request.
Plan for at least two Pix providers. Provider outages are rare but visible, and a second route keeps payments flowing while the first recovers.
Plan for cross-border costs. If you charge Brazilian cards in a foreign currency, the shopper pays 3.5% IOF on top of your price, and physical goods shipped from abroad carry import tax and ICMS, so compare local BRL acquiring with cross-border acquiring before you set prices.
Plan for reconciliation in BRL. Settlement currency, FX timing and provider fees differ, and the routing-decision log in Omno shows which provider handled each payment so finance teams can reconcile by route.