RBI Enhances UPI Lite Transaction Limits: Rs 1,000 Per Transaction And Rs 5,000 Per Day

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) increased the transaction limits in the Unified Payment Interface (UPI) Lite through its notification dated December 4, 2024. RBI amended the framework and increased per transaction in UPI Lite from Rs 500 to Rs 1000, and the daily transaction limit from Rs 2000 to Rs 5000. According to the notification, “The Offline framework has been updated and the enhanced limits for UPI Lite shall be ₹1,000 per transaction, with ₹5,000 being the total limit at any point in time”.

RBI had announced to increase the transaction limits for UPI Lite previously during its Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting in October 2024. It said, “A limit of ₹500 per transaction and an overall limit of ₹2000 per UPI Lite wallet, is presently applicable, with the facility of auto-replenishment. To widen the scope of usage of this product, it has now been decided to increase the UPI Lite wallet limit to ₹5,000 and per-transaction limit to ₹1,000.” It said that the framework will be amended suitably to facilitate better adoption of this offline facility.

Now, with the latest notification, this amendment has taken place and became applicable with immediate effect.

UPI Lite:

UPI Lite is a digital wallet where one can transfer money and make payments directly without using the PIN to authorise every transaction. The facility is useful for making frequent small-value transactions with ease. It is also useful for keeping the account statement uncluttered by making small-value transactions digitally but separately.  

The increased limits will be available for offline transactions in UPI Lite through UPI Lite X. The feature does not need interment connectivity and thus enables users to transfer money offline to a payee. This is particularly useful in remote areas with poor or no internet connectivity and areas such as lifts in high-rise buildings, basements, flights, etc.

How Will It Benefit Users?

Dilip Modi, founder and CEO, Spice Money, says, “This move directly addresses the needs of individuals in regions with inconsistent internet access by enabling faster, more convenient offline transactions, particularly for small-value payments. This further strengthens the foundation for a robust and secure digital payments framework by expanding the reach of UPI to new user segments”.

Now, the enhanced limits for offline transactions are expected to improve digital penetration in untapped areas and for more use cases.

UPI transactions have been surging every year since its launch in 2016. This year, it hit 16.6 billion transactions in October 2024 compared to 11.41 billion in October 2023. The year-over-year growing trend is evident in November data as well where transaction volume grew to 15.48 billion in November 2024 compared to 11.23 billion in the same month the previous year.