Checkout.com vs Adyen UK 2026: Fees, Features & Which to Choose

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Checkout.com and Adyen are two of the most capable enterprise-grade payment processors available to UK businesses in 2026. Checkout.com, founded in 2012 and FCA-authorised under reference 900816, suits digital-first businesses, fintechs, and marketplaces that want an API-led integration with strong local payment method coverage in the Middle East and Asia. Adyen, founded in 2006, operates in the UK as an authorised bank branch under PRA and FCA supervision (FCA reference 779800), and is built for large omnichannel retailers and multinationals that need a single platform spanning online, in-store, and in-app payments. Both use interchange-plus pricing, require an enterprise contract, and are unsuitable for businesses processing below roughly £500,000 a year. The key differences are in-person hardware (Adyen leads), geographic local acquiring in the Gulf and Asia (Checkout.com leads), and the minimum monthly cost (Adyen charges at least £120 per month; Checkout.com has no published monthly minimum).

Key Facts

Who Is This Page For?

This page is written for finance directors, heads of payments, CTOs, and senior operations managers at UK businesses processing significant card volume who are deciding between Checkout.com and Adyen. It is also relevant to fintech founders, marketplace operators, and omnichannel retailers evaluating enterprise payment processors for the first time. If you process under £500,000 a year in card payments, neither provider is likely to be a realistic fit. See our guide to best merchant accounts for small businesses instead.

Checkout.com vs Adyen: Fee Comparison

What is Checkout.com?

Checkout.com is a global payment processor founded in 2012 and headquartered in London. It provides a direct acquiring connection to Visa and Mastercard, which means fewer intermediaries in the transaction chain and typically better authorisation rates. The platform is built API-first, making it popular with development-heavy teams at fintechs, digital marketplaces, and large e-commerce brands. Clients have included Deliveroo, Wise, and Coinbase.

In the UK, Checkout.com operates as an FCA-authorised e-money institution. Pricing is not published publicly and must be negotiated, which suits larger businesses that can extract meaningful discounts through volume. The platform supports over 150 currencies and more than 20 local payment methods globally. You can find a full breakdown on the Checkout.com review page.

What is Adyen?

Adyen is a Dutch payment company founded in 2006 and listed on Euronext Amsterdam since 2018. It holds its own acquiring licences across Europe, North America, and Asia-Pacific, and connects directly to card schemes including Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and UnionPay. That direct connection typically results in higher authorisation rates and lower overall processing costs for high-volume merchants. UK clients include ASOS, Superdry, and JD Sports.

Adyen's defining feature is its unified commerce platform, which handles online payments, in-person card machines, and in-app transactions through a single back-end and a single set of reports. The £120 minimum monthly invoice makes it unsuitable for small businesses, but for high-volume operations the pricing is genuinely competitive. See the Adyen review page for a full assessment.

How Does Adyen's Interchange-Plus Pricing Work?

Adyen's interchange-plus model passes the raw interchange cost directly to the merchant and adds a fixed processing fee on top. For most UK and European personal Visa and Mastercard transactions, the interchange component is capped under UK FCA regulations following the interchange fee caps introduced under the Interchange Fee Regulation. Adyen's own processing fee starts from around £0.11 per transaction, with the exact figure negotiated based on monthly volume and card mix. At £1 million a month in card turnover, a difference of even £0.02 per transaction equates to roughly £2,000 a month in savings, so the negotiation is worth doing carefully. For a deeper explanation of how interchange-plus compares to blended rates, see our guide to interchange-plus vs blended pricing.

Checkout.com uses a similar structure. Its margin above interchange is typically around 0.20%, plus a per-transaction fee agreed at contract stage. Neither provider publishes a rate card, so benchmarking requires requesting quotes from both simultaneously. Compare Card Fees is a free, independent advisory service that has helped UK businesses find better card payment deals since 2012. Use the free comparison tool to request quotes from both providers with identical assumptions.

Checkout.com vs Adyen: Features Compared

Payment Methods

Both providers accept Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and major digital wallets including Apple Pay and Google Pay. Checkout.com supports over 20 alternative payment methods including Klarna, iDEAL, Sofort, and PayPal, with strong coverage across the Middle East and Asia where the company has invested heavily. Adyen covers a similar range globally, with particularly strong local payment method support in the Netherlands, Germany, Brazil, and China. For UK domestic traffic the difference is minimal. For a business expanding into Southeast Asia or the Gulf, Checkout.com's local acquiring licences in those regions can reduce cross-border fees meaningfully.

Hardware and In-Person Terminals

Adyen has a clear advantage here. Its Adyen Terminal API powers a range of POS terminals under the AMS (Adyen-managed) hardware programme, including the AMS M400, AMS P400, and the AMS V400m portable terminal. These devices run on the same platform as Adyen's online gateway, so reconciliation is straightforward. Checkout.com launched its own in-person payment hardware in 2022, but the offering remains limited in the UK compared to Adyen's mature terminal estate. If your business takes significant face-to-face payments, Adyen is the stronger choice.

Integrations

Checkout.com offers pre-built integrations with Shopify, Magento, WooCommerce, Salesforce Commerce Cloud, and SAP, alongside its Frames.js hosted payment form and a full REST API. Adyen integrates with similar platforms and additionally supports SAP S/4HANA, Oracle Retail, and several enterprise ERP systems at a deeper level. Both have extensive API documentation. For a team building a fully custom checkout from scratch, either will serve well. For a business running on an enterprise ERP, Adyen's integrations are typically more mature. See our guide to payment gateway integrations for more context on what to look for.

International Support and Cross-Border Fees

Checkout.com holds direct acquiring licences in 20-plus markets, including the UK, EU, US, UAE, Singapore, and Australia. Local acquiring in those regions usually improves authorisation rates by two to five percentage points compared to cross-border processing, and eliminates or reduces cross-border assessment fees that card schemes charge when the acquirer and the cardholder are in different regions. Adyen holds direct licences across a comparable but slightly broader set of markets, with particular depth in Europe and North America. Both providers support multi-currency settlement.

For a UK business selling domestically, the difference is irrelevant. For a direct-to-consumer brand processing significant volume in the UAE, Singapore, or Hong Kong, Checkout.com's local acquiring licences in those specific markets can meaningfully reduce total cost of acceptance. Adyen is the stronger choice for businesses with heavy volume across Europe and North America. For a business expanding across multiple regions simultaneously, it is worth requesting authorisation rate data and local fee schedules from both providers before signing.

Card-on-File and Recurring Payments

Both Checkout.com and Adyen support card-on-file tokenisation, which stores a customer's card details securely so they can be charged again without re-entering credentials. Checkout.com's network tokenisation feature works with Visa and Mastercard to update stored tokens automatically when a card is replaced or renewed, which reduces involuntary churn on subscription businesses. Adyen offers equivalent network tokenisation and also benefits from its unified data layer, meaning card-on-file credentials stored for online use can in some configurations be referenced for in-store payments too. For subscription businesses and platforms with returning customers, both are strong choices. Checkout.com has a slight edge in documented fintech use cases; Adyen's cross-channel token portability is useful for omnichannel retailers.

Fraud and Risk Tools

Checkout.com includes its Fraud Detection Pro tool as standard on enterprise accounts. It uses machine learning to score transactions and supports 3D Secure 2 (3DS2) with dynamic challenge exemption management. Adyen's equivalent is RevenueProtect, a rules-based and machine-learning fraud engine that sits within the same unified platform as its payment processing. RevenueProtect benefits from Adyen's full data picture across online and in-store channels, which can improve fraud model accuracy for omnichannel merchants. Both tools comply with the FCA and FPS requirements around Strong Customer Authentication under the UK's Payment Services Regulations 2017. For a business operating solely online, both are broadly equivalent. For an omnichannel operator, Adyen's cross-channel fraud data is a genuine advantage. Our guide to 3D Secure and Strong Customer Authentication explains the UK regulatory requirements in more detail.

Customer Support

Neither provider offers phone support to the general market. Checkout.com enterprise clients get a dedicated account manager and access to 24/7 technical support via a ticketing system. Response times in practice vary. Some merchants report strong account management; others note that support quality drops after initial onboarding. Adyen provides a dedicated merchant success team for enterprise accounts and has a developer documentation portal that is widely regarded as one of the better ones in the industry. Neither provider is suitable for a business that wants to pick up a phone and speak to someone quickly. Both expect your team to be technically capable of self-serving most queries.

Pros and Cons

Checkout.com Pros and Cons

Pros

• Direct acquiring in 20-plus markets reduces cross-border fees and improves authorisation rates
• API-first platform is well suited to development teams building custom checkout flows
• Strong local payment method coverage in the Middle East and Asia
• No published minimum monthly fee, which gives slightly more flexibility at lower enterprise volumes
• Competitive interchange-plus pricing for high-volume accounts
• Network tokenisation for Visa and Mastercard reduces involuntary churn on subscription businesses

Cons

• In-person terminal hardware is limited compared to Adyen and is not a strong choice for omnichannel retailers
• Pricing is entirely opaque. You cannot benchmark rates without going through a sales process
• Some merchants report inconsistent support quality after the initial onboarding phase
• Not suitable for businesses processing below approximately £500,000 per year due to enterprise-only contracting

Adyen Pros and Cons

Pros

• Unified commerce platform handles online, in-store, and in-app payments through a single integration and reporting dashboard
• Mature POS terminal hardware estate with a wide range of Adyen-managed devices
• Direct card scheme licences across a broad set of markets typically deliver strong authorisation rates
• RevenueProtect fraud engine benefits from cross-channel transaction data, which is useful for omnichannel operators
• Well-regarded developer documentation and API

Cons

• The £120 minimum monthly invoice makes Adyen uneconomical for any business not processing significant volume
• Pricing is not published. Rate negotiation requires engaging the sales team and typically takes several weeks
• Onboarding can be slow. Some merchants report a process lasting six to eight weeks before going live
• Account management quality varies. Smaller enterprise accounts sometimes receive less attention than flagship clients

Which is Better For...?

High-Volume E-commerce Businesses

For a UK e-commerce business processing over £1 million a month with a predominantly digital customer base, both providers are viable. Checkout.com's API-first design and strong developer tooling make integration faster for a technical team. Its direct acquiring in markets like the UAE and Singapore gives it an edge if a meaningful share of your revenue comes from those regions. Adyen is equally capable online and typically offers strong authorisation rates through its direct scheme connections. The decision here often comes down to which provider offers the better negotiated rate for your specific card mix. Our guide to e-commerce payment gateways covers the key factors to weigh up.

Omnichannel Retailers

Adyen wins this category clearly. Its unified platform across POS terminals, online checkout, and in-app payments is purpose-built for retailers operating across multiple channels. Having a single data layer for in-store and online transactions simplifies reconciliation, fraud management, and customer identification. Checkout.com's in-person offering is still developing and would require a separate POS solution for most retailers, adding complexity and cost.

Fintechs and Marketplaces

Checkout.com is the stronger fit here. It has built significant infrastructure for platforms that need to split payments between buyers and sellers, manage sub-merchant accounts, or process across multiple currencies simultaneously. Its marketplace and platform payment features are well documented and actively developed. Adyen does offer a Platforms product, but Checkout.com's experience with fintech clients like Wise and Deliveroo gives it a credible track record in this space. See our guide to marketplace payment solutions for more on what to look for in a platform payment provider.

Businesses Expanding Internationally

Both providers have genuine global reach, but the choice depends on your target markets. Checkout.com's local acquiring strength in the Middle East and parts of Asia gives it an advantage for businesses expanding into those regions. Adyen's depth in Europe, North America, and Australia is hard to match. If you are expanding across multiple regions simultaneously, it is worth requesting authorisation rate data from both providers for your specific markets before committing.

DTC Brands Selling in Multiple Currencies

Direct-to-consumer brands processing across multiple currencies face two main costs: the interchange rate itself, and the cross-border assessment fees card schemes charge when the acquirer sits in a different country to the cardholder. Both Checkout.com and Adyen reduce these fees by holding local acquiring licences in key markets. Checkout.com's local presence in the UAE, Singapore, and Australia makes it the stronger choice for DTC brands with significant Asia-Pacific or Gulf revenue. Adyen is better suited to DTC brands whose international volume is concentrated in Europe. Either way, you should ask each provider for a fee breakdown by currency corridor, not just a headline rate, before signing a contract. Our guide to interchange fees in the UK explains how the underlying costs are structured.

Our Verdict

Checkout.com and Adyen are both excellent processors, but they serve slightly different needs. Adyen is the better choice for large omnichannel retailers that want a single platform across every sales channel, a mature terminal estate, and strong European market depth. Checkout.com is the better choice for digital-first businesses, fintechs, and marketplaces that need a highly customisable API, strong coverage in the Middle East and Asia, and a platform designed around developers.

The honest caveat for both is that pricing is entirely negotiated. A rate that looks competitive on paper may not be the best available to your business. Both providers charge interchange-plus, which is transparent in structure but opaque in the margin applied on top. The only way to know whether you are getting a fair deal is to get competing quotes. Our guide on how to negotiate card processing fees explains what levers to pull.