For years Indians have paid for nearly everything with UPI but foreigners were prevented from using it (unless you had an Indian bank account). Since last summer UPI has opened to foreign travelers and it is a must have. Transfer funds from your bank or cc account instantly and you’ll have the equivalent INR in your Mony account.Two important things to remember however!1. There is a fee to transfer and your bank will obviously charge a conversion fee. So UPI may be more about convenience than savings. YMMV.2. UPI is run by the government and as of March 2026 foreigners cannot pay to personal accounts. MANY people like auto drivers and small vendors do NOT have business accounts so you will still need cash (or credit cards depending on the payee).Nonetheless Mony is the app to use because you can set it up and verify before coming to India. From looking at the other few apps that support foreign UPI, that’s not the case. You will have to verify in person once in India. Mony makes it much simpler.

Using it for the first time on travels to India. Set up and initial KYC were quick. However, Upgrade request took a while to be fulfilled. Plus the myriad annoying restrictions on top-ups, transactions, etc., were a bit of a downer. Service fees and fees charged for credit card top-up are a bit excessive: 3.5%. Bank account top ups are more reasonable…overall, seamless experience once the initial hiccups and Upgrade were resolved.

You need a UPI app in India, now. I have only tried Mony, & it’s a fairly good one. It works pretty seamlessly. It took almost two days to set up (a human being needs to verify you before you can start using the app), so build in an expectation of delay when you get started. At this point in time, you can only make transfers to business accounts. You thus can’t give friends money, & you will only very rarely be able to pay for autorickshaws with Mony. While Indians can use UPI for almost anything (even a cup of tea at a tea point), you will need to manage two payment systems—UPI & cash.

It’s a very helpful app for foreigners needing to pay for things in India. However, a big negative for me is that so far, no refunds have come through. I used this to buy groceries on a delivery app. The money was charged but the order didn’t go through. Silly me, I tried two more times till it worked as I assumed that money would be credited back. The same week I had to do a return on a clothing purchase. It’s been a month now of the Mony app people saying “thank you for your patience, it’s pending with our partner bank and your case is top priority.” I’m beginning to think they just stall till you have to leave the country. Useful- but only if you know there’s no chance of a refund.