Japan’s e-commerce titan Rakuten will let its 44 million customers use XRP for everyday payments, the company and Ripple confirmed.
In a post on X, Tatsuya Kohrogi, Ripple’s senior ecosystem growth manager, said Rakuten is integrating XRP into its Rakuten Pay app and Rakuten Wallet. Starting April 15, XRP will be listed as an asset in Rakuten Wallet and available as a payment option across more than 5 million merchant locations in Japan. Users will also be able to spot-trade XRP in the app, purchase XRP with Rakuten Points, and hold their XRP in Rakuten Wallet.
The move stitches XRP into one of Japan’s largest loyalty ecosystems. Rakuten’s network circulates more than 3 trillion points—worth roughly $23 billion—that can now be converted into XRP, giving customers a new way to spend loyalty rewards. Kohrogi called the integration “one of the most significant XRP milestones,” and highlighted Rakuten’s reputation as a trusted consumer brand, saying embedding XRP into its loyalty and payments infrastructure “is a powerful signal of where digital asset adoption is heading.”
This isn’t Rakuten’s first step into crypto: the company added support for bitcoin, ether and bitcoin cash in 2023, and in 2021 unveiled Rakuten Coin for its points-based loyalty program. The latest move significantly broadens XRP’s real-world utility in Japan by linking it to a massive customer base and widespread merchant acceptance.
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