Rates change without notice. Confirm current pricing on each provider’s own page before deciding.
The three rates that matter
HitPay charges 2.8% plus 50 cents on a domestic online card transaction in Singapore. Stripe charges 3.4% plus 50 cents for the same transaction. Airwallex charges 3.30% plus 50 cents, its own published flat rate, cheaper than Stripe on card processing but still above HitPay.
None of the three charge a setup fee. HitPay and the Airwallex Explore plan (above a S$5,000 monthly deposit or S$10,000 balance) also skip the monthly fee. Stripe has no monthly fee on its standard plan either. The gap between providers shows up entirely in the per-transaction rate, not in fixed costs.
Where PayNow changes the math
For a business with a mostly local Singapore customer base, PayNow usually beats card processing on all three platforms. This is where HitPay pulls ahead. HitPay charges 0.65% plus 30 cents on PayNow transactions above S$100, dropping to 0.9% with a 20 cent minimum below that threshold. On a S$150 sale, that is roughly S$1.28 in fees through PayNow versus roughly S$4.70 through a domestic card on the same platform.
A seller who can shift checkout mix toward PayNow, through UI placement or a small discount nudge, cuts payment cost more by changing customer behavior than by changing providers.
International cards and cross-border selling
This is where the three diverge most. Stripe adds 0.5% on top of its domestic rate for international cards, plus a further 2% if currency conversion is required, bringing a converted international transaction to roughly 5.9% plus 50 cents. HitPay’s international card rate is 3.65% plus 50 cents, a fixed and clearly published number, the cheapest of the three on international cards. Airwallex charges 3.60% plus 50 cents on international cards, close to HitPay’s rate and well below Stripe’s once currency conversion applies. Airwallex’s underlying product is a multi-currency account rather than a single-market gateway, so a business that actually holds or converts multiple currencies may still find more value there than the headline card rate alone shows.
A worked example
Take S$10,000 in monthly revenue, split 70% domestic card and 30% PayNow, a realistic mix for a Singapore D2C store in 2026.
On HitPay: card fees run roughly S$233 on the S$7,000 card portion, PayNow fees run roughly S$20 on the S$3,000 portion. Total: about S$253.
On Stripe: the S$7,000 card portion costs roughly S$266 at the 3.4% plus fixed-fee rate. Stripe does not offer a PayNow rate structured the same way as HitPay’s dedicated bank-transfer pricing, so the comparison here favors a gateway that treats PayNow as a first-class payment method, which HitPay does more directly than Stripe.
On Airwallex, at its published 3.30% plus 50 cents domestic card rate: roughly S$231 on the S$7,000 card portion, cheaper than Stripe and close to HitPay’s card rate, though HitPay still wins once PayNow volume is added in.
The verdict
HitPay is the stronger default for a Singapore-only or Singapore-majority seller who takes a meaningful share of payments through PayNow, because its PayNow rate is the cheapest of the three and its card rate is also the lowest of the three.
Stripe fits a business already built inside Stripe’s broader ecosystem, subscription billing, Stripe Terminal, or a checkout already wired to Stripe’s API, where switching cost outweighs the fee gap, though it is now the most expensive of the three on both domestic and international cards.
Airwallex is worth a direct look for a business with meaningful cross-border or multi-currency volume, or simply as a cheaper alternative to Stripe on card processing, since its published card rates undercut Stripe’s on both domestic and international transactions.
None of these figures should be taken as final. Request a live quote from each provider before switching, and re-check this page’s “last verified” date before relying on it.
Research Ledger (9 claims)
| Entity | Claim | Source | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| HitPay | 2.8% + S$0.50 domestic card, online | hitpayapp.com/sg/pricing | VERIFIED |
| HitPay | 3.65% + S$0.50 international card | hitpayapp.com/sg/pricing | VERIFIED |
| HitPay | PayNow 0.65% + S$0.30 above S$100, 0.9% (min S$0.20) below | hitpayapp.com blog, payment methods guide | VERIFIED |
| HitPay | No monthly fee, no setup fee | hitpayapp.com/sg/pricing | VERIFIED |
| Stripe | 3.4% + S$0.50 domestic card | stripe.com/en-sg/pricing, checked directly 29 July 2026 | VERIFIED |
| Stripe | International cards add 0.5% on top of the domestic rate; a further 2% applies if currency conversion is required | stripe.com/en-sg/pricing, checked directly 29 July 2026 | VERIFIED |
| Airwallex | 3.30% + S$0.50 domestic card | airwallex.com/sg/pricing, checked directly 29 July 2026 | VERIFIED |
| Airwallex | 3.60% + S$0.50 international card | airwallex.com/sg/pricing, checked directly 29 July 2026 | VERIFIED |
| Airwallex | No monthly fee on Explore plan if S$5,000+ deposited monthly or S$10,000 balance held, otherwise a monthly fee applies | transferfees.io fee breakdown | VERIFIED |
Every row was checked directly against the provider’s own pricing page on 29 July 2026. An earlier draft of this article cited a marketed “from 1.0%” Airwallex floor rate sourced from a third-party comparison guide. That figure does not appear on Airwallex’s own pricing page and is not used here. Airwallex’s own page lists a flat 3.30% domestic card rate, not a variable Interchange++ floor.