Australia's Commonwealth Bank Now Supports Apple Pay

Commonwealth Bank (CBA) today implemented support for Apple Pay, making it the second of Australia's "Big Four" banks to offer the payments service. CBA is the biggest retail bank in Australia and was a notable ‌Apple Pay‌ holdout.

Multiple MacRumors readers in Australia have reported being able to add their Commonwealth Bank cards to ‌Apple Pay‌, and Commonwealth Bank is listed as a partner on Apple's Apple Pay site in Australia.

commonwealth bank apple pay
Commonwealth Bank first announced plans to support ‌Apple Pay‌ last month, giving in to consumer demand after a years-long dispute with Apple over fees and access to the NFC chips in iPhones.

When announcing ‌Apple Pay‌ support, Commonwealth Bank Group Executive of Retail Banking services Angus Sullivan said that the bank had heard many requests from customers asking for ‌Apple Pay‌, leading to its implementation.

"We are committed to making changes that benefit our customers and simplify our business. We will continue to look for more opportunities to innovate and listen, to ensure our customers get the best experience when they bank with us. Responding to customer demand for Apple Pay underscores our commitment to becoming a better, simpler bank.

Commonwealth Bank, along with NAB and Westpac, tried to collectively bargain with Apple to attempt to force Apple to open up the iPhone's NFC capabilities to support other digital wallets, like those offered by the banks themselves.

Apple said that this would be harmful to consumers and would stifle innovation, a position that Australian regulators agreed with when denying the banks authorization for collective bargaining.


ANZ was the only one of the four major banks in Australia to support ‌Apple Pay‌ when it launched in the country in April 2016. Other smaller banks later implemented support, but Commonwealth, NAB, and Westpac continued to hold out amid negotiations.

It's not clear if NAB and Westpac will implement support now that Commonwealth Bank has done so.

Bankwest in Australia is also now supporting ‌Apple Pay‌, along with ASB Bank Limited in New Zealand and Bank of America Merrill Lynch in Canada. Multiple smaller banks in the U.S. have implemented ‌Apple Pay‌ support as well, with a full list available on Apple's website.

Related Roundup: Apple Pay

Popular Stories

apple store down feature

Here's Why the Apple Store is Going Down

Thursday November 27, 2025 1:01 pm PST by
Apple's online store is going down for a few hours on a rolling country-by-country basis right now, but do not get your hopes up for new products. Apple takes its online store down for a few hours ahead of Black Friday every year to tease/prepare for its annual gift card offer with the purchase of select products. The store already went down and came back online in Australia and New Zealand, ...
iPhone Pocket Short

iPhone Pocket is Now Completely Sold Out Worldwide

Tuesday November 25, 2025 7:16 am PST by
Apple recently teamed up with Japanese fashion brand ISSEY MIYAKE to create the iPhone Pocket, a limited-edition knitted accessory designed to carry an iPhone. However, it is now completely sold out in all countries where it was released. iPhone Pocket became available to order on Apple's online store starting Friday, November 14, in the United States, France, China, Italy, Japan, Singapore, ...
New Intel Logo

Apple and Intel Rumored to Partner on Mac Chips Again in a New Way

Friday November 28, 2025 7:33 am PST by
While all Macs are now powered by Apple's custom-designed chips, a new rumor claims that Apple may rekindle its partnership with Intel, albeit in a new and limited way. Apple supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo today said Intel is expected to begin shipping Apple's lowest-end M-series chip as early as mid-2027. Kuo said Apple plans to utilize Intel's 18A process, which is the "earliest...
streaming black friday 2025

Best Black Friday Streaming Deals - Save Big on Apple TV, Disney+, Hulu, and More

Thursday November 27, 2025 1:14 pm PST by
We've been focusing on deals on physical products over the past few weeks, but Black Friday is also a great time of year to purchase a streaming membership. Some of the biggest services have great discounts for new and select returning members this week, including Apple TV, Disney+, Hulu, Paramount+, Peacock, and more. Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When...
Apple Foldable Thumb

Foldable iPhone to Debut These Three Breakthrough Features

Tuesday November 25, 2025 7:09 am PST by
Apple's first foldable iPhone is expected to launch alongside the iPhone 18 Pro models in fall 2026, and it's shaping up to include three standout features that could set it apart from the competition. The book-style foldable will reportedly feature an industry-first 24-megapixel under-display camera built into the inner display, according to a recent JP Morgan equity research report. That...
iphone air camera

iPhone Air Flop Sparks Industry Retreat From Ultra-Thin Phones

Thursday November 27, 2025 3:14 am PST by
Apple's disappointing iPhone Air sales are causing major Chinese mobile vendors to scrap or freeze their own ultra-thin phone projects, according to reports coming out of Asia. Since the ‌iPhone Air‌ launched in September, there have been reports of poor sales and manufacturing cuts, while Apple's supply chain has scaled back shipments and production. Apple supplier Foxconn has...
iphone black friday gold

The Best Black Friday iPhone Deals Still Available

Friday November 28, 2025 6:24 am PST by
Cellular carriers have always offered big savings on the newest iPhone models during the holidays, and Black Friday 2025 sales have kicked off at AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and more. Right now we're tracking notable offers on the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, and iPhone Air. For even more savings, keep an eye on older models during the holiday shopping season. Note: MacRumors is...

Top Rated Comments

domneedscoffee Avatar
90 months ago
Can't believe it's nearly 3 years already since I moved to ANZ...
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
desmond2046 Avatar
90 months ago
Ironically, Apple Pay is much more widely supported in Australia than in the US, especially for small businesses, because most of the POS machines in Australia already support tap-and-pay.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
JoshBoy Avatar
90 months ago
Westpac have lost 30% of their market cap over the last two years and is being investigated by the government for bad practice. Nope, I don’t think they are that great
All banks in Australia have lost market cap mainly due to regulation and capital requirements. They still are a dividend play like always, not a growth play.

Westpac still is the second largest by market cap in the country.

To lastly state they are getting investigated for bad practices is fake news. There is a royal commission taking place and from my view Westpac have come through far better than any of the other majors and the only major to retain their wealth arm of the big four.
[doublepost=1548207713][/doublepost]
Get real
You're seriously trying to compare the Australia, with a population of what, 25 million to the US's 325 million?
You could dump the entire population of Australia into four or five mid western states and you be hard press to find your cousin.

If Australia was state, it wouldn't even be the largest state by population, California has more people.

There is no irony here.

Only a much larger economy with a scale you failed to take into account.

Here is some background into US challenges:

UK’s Lessons For US Mobile Payments Adoption ('https://www.pymnts.com/nfc/2016/uk-lessons-for-us-mobile-payments-adoption/')
Here's an excerpt:

NOW FOR THE “BUT”

OK, you say, so all we need to do now is hustle up and get contactless POS terminals out there in massive force.

If it were only that easy.

In the U.S., there simply aren’t the same dynamics in play.

Two million contactless terminals today sounds like a great start — until you do the math. There are something like 13 million POS terminals across a massive geography that is the United States, not including mPOS devices.

The U.S. is also a market in which there are 1.2 billion payments cards in circulation, more than 47 billion debit card transactions, more than 26 billion credit card transactions and 209 million adults over the age of 18.

Oh, and something like 14k financial institutions that issue those cards and countless merchant acquirers and ISOs all hawking merchants to deploy new terminals.

It’s a whole lot harder to wrangle this ecosystem to the ground given the diversity of merchants and the engrained plastic card habits honed by consumers over the last 50 or so years.
I do love how much room we have to swing a cat (the one size is basically the same as the entire US) oh and we tend not to shoot each other too much.

Attachment Image
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Glasgowuk Avatar
90 months ago
Judging by their share price, they haven't missed you, Lol
[doublepost=1548199349][/doublepost]

"Incredibly stupid"? Have you seen their net worth!! You would dream to be that "incredibly stupid"!
Westpac have lost 30% of their market cap over the last two years and is being investigated by the government for bad practice. Nope, I don’t think they are that great
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Juiceboy Avatar
90 months ago
Australia had tap and go for years. It's incredible popular here. Most people don't even carry cash ever.
Vending machines, sushi joints everywhere accept contactless payments so apple pay is available everywhere. It's baffling that places like "wall-mart" or what ever the american stores are called don't accept apple pay for some observed reason.

What ever retailer has a POS terminal from the last 10 years that accept contactless, accepts apple pay by default.
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
JoshBoy Avatar
90 months ago
Swing cats? Nice deflection, however irrelevant.
Incidentally, plenty of room in the US to swing cats if that's your thing.
By the way nice pic, which is also irrelevant.

Another deflection.
You're on a roll.
Point did not pass me by, I just cringe when I read statements from Americans that feel they are the biggest and best in the world. Whilst we may only have circa $25m I say quality over quantity.

The other persons post you were attacking was just making the point that as a nation we have adopted to tech in this space far better than other locations. The same thing happened where we moved to 3G phones back in about 2000/2001 when the US were still trying to adopt Edge.
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)