Apple’s mobile payment service is coming to Hong Kong’s popular Octopus cash transit cards.
Based on the FeliCa standard, Octopus works with Apple Watch and iPhone 7 or newer.
Apple customers in Hong Kong will soon be able to add their Octopus card to the Wallet app and use it for contactless transit and retail payments with Apple Pay and iOS 13 in the fall. And thanks to iOS’s Express Transit integration which bypasses the usual Face/Touch ID authentication requirements, customers will be able to pay with their Octopus card in the Wallet app without authenticating, simply by tapping their device on a nearby NFC terminal.
A statement from Octopus makes the news official:
Committed to providing innovative Octopus payment services to meet customers’ diverse payment needs, Octopus Cards Limited is excited to announce that customers will be able to use their Octopus on their iPhone or Apple Watch for transit and retail payment with Apple Pay later this year. More details will be shared soon.
Octopus used to be limited to Galaxy handsets due to an exclusivity agreement with Samsung.
Octopus is accepted in subways, buses, trams, ferries, supermarkets, pharmacies, vending machines, coffee shops and numerous other locations. The reloadable electronic payment solution debuted back in 1997 as a tap-to-pay physical card before expanding to smartphones with Smart Octopus for Samsung Pay in 2017.
As for Apple’s Express Transit, it’s currently available in Japan, Beijing, Shanghai and parts of New York City though the feature is thought to soon become available to customers in London.