What is NOWPayments?

NOWPayments is actually a product that came out of the greater ChangeNOW platform. ChangeNOW is a non-custodial, instant crypto exchange where users are able to swap between different crypto assets via a simple interface.

ChangeNOW effectively acts as a backend exchange for certain aspects of the NOWPayments payment processing system. NOWPayments users are able to accept more than 50 different crypto assets, and those assets can be received in the form of any crypto asset of the merchant’s choice, as the swaps are handled by ChangeNOW.

Additionally, NOWPayments users are able to have their crypto assets converted to fiat currency as soon as those payments are received. There are a number of different ways in which the NOWPayments platform can be used over the internet, from donation buttons on websites to invoices for freelance workers. The goal of NOWPayments is to make it as easy as possible for anyone to accept cryptocurrency payments.

Is NOWPayments Safe?

NOWPayments is a relatively new product in the grand scheme of things; however, ChangeNOW, which is the company behind the NOWPayments platform, has been operating in the cryptocurrency space for a number of years now. ChangeNOW has never faced a serious security incident, and NOWPayments can effectively inherit this strong security record from their parent platform. Additionally, ChangeNOW has been able to help crypto exchange hack victims recover some of their funds during past incidents on other platforms.

It’s also important to note that NOWPayments, just like ChangeNOW, is a non-custodial crypto platform. This means that users’ funds are rarely at risk because the amount of time that funds are out of users’ control is extremely limited.

Since users are controlling the private keys associated with their crypto assets on their own, risk is only really introduced when some kind of swap is being made between different assets. Allowing users to retain control over their funds is a sign of a strong security setup; however, it also means users must be comfortable with a higher degree of responsibility over the security of their funds.

It should also be pointed out that a number of positive reviews have been left for NOWPaymnets on Trustpilot. For example, Travala COO Steve Hipwell and Arcadia Group CEO Rasikh Morani have both had great things to say about the cryptocurrency payment platform.

How Much Does NOWPayments Cost?

There are a few different fees to worry about when it comes to NOWPayments. Of course, it should be remembered that cryptocurrency users are able to transact with each other directly, and removing middlemen like NOWPayments was a key reason Bitcoin was invented in the first place. That said, NOWPayments and other crypto payment processors can offer a level of simplicity and convenience with their crypto services that is difficult to achieve with nothing more than open-source software. For many less-technical users, the fees charged by NOWPayments will be more than worth it.

The base transaction fee for processing crypto payments via NOWPayments is 0.5%. To be clear, this is only for payments that do not involve any sort of swapping between different crypto assets. In other words, this is the base fee on, for example, a transaction that is sent in bitcoin and received in bitcoin. That said, NOWPayments users are able to get a discount on these fees if they do a large amount of monthly volume. The fee drops to 0.45% with 50 bitcoin of monthly volume, 0.4% with 100 bitcoin of monthly volume, and even lower once the 200 bitcoin per month threshold has been met.

If the recipient of a payment via NOWPayments want to receive funds in a crypto asset that is different from the one that was sent, then another 0.5% fee is added to the transaction. This is to cover the cost of swapping between different crypto assets on the backend via ChangeNOW. The total fees are also around 1% per transaction if the user would like to avoid crypto volatility and receive payments in U.S. dollars or some other fiat currency.

It should also be noted that NOWPayments does not cover crypto currency network fees. This means that the sender of any crypto payment will need to cover these fees, which can get rather high on popular blockchain networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum.

What are the Best Features of NOWPayments?

The best features of NOWPayments revolve around the platform’s ability to make it extremely simple and easy to accept cryptocurrency payments over the internet. It’s easy to integrate NOWPayments into content management systems that you may already be using on your website, such as WooCommerce, and the NOWPayments customer support team can help you with every step of the setup process.

The use of the ChangeNOW crypto exchange on the backend also hides a lot of the complexities that can come with managing a large number of different crypto assets when you’re just trying to accept payments online. NOWPayments users are able to accept more than 50 different crypto assets after integrating with the platform, but recipients of payments are able to automatically convert all of those different crypto payment methods to a single, preferred cryptocurrency or to traditional fiat currency like U.S. dollars.

NOWPayments not only makes it easy to accept cryptocurrency payments but also helps merchants manage their crypto finances once those payments have been received.

Potential Dealbreakers

There are a few potential dealbreakers with using NOWPayments as a crypto payment processor as well.

For one, the concept of a payment processor for cryptocurrency transactions is sort of redundant. The whole point of cryptocurrency is that the sender and receiver of a payment are able to transact with each other without the need for a third-party intermediary. NOWPayments reintroduces a third party between crypto transactions, so Bitcoin and crypto purists may be turned off by this method of adding crypto payments to their websites. Of course, the tradeoff is that NOWPayments offers a much higher level of convenience for less technical users who may not be able to figure out how to operate their own Bitcoin full node software or BTCPay Server. That said, putting a middleman in between users of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency networks means higher transaction costs and a potential need to go through a verification process for the purposes of complying with KYC and anti-money laundering regulations.

Another potential dealbreaker with NOWPayments is that it isn’t very useful for merchants who have physical stores with point-of-sale (PoS) systems. You could find a way to set this up in a roundabout manner, but brick and mortar stores would be better off with an alternative crypto payment processor that is better integrated with existing PoS systems.

One final potential dealbreaker with NOWPayments is that it does not support Bitcoin’s Lightning Network or any other layer-two system for cheaper payments. On-chain transaction fees for both Bitcoin and Ethereum have risen substantially over the years, which is why it makes sense to move smaller denomination payments to secondary layers that do not necessarily need the high degree of decentralization offered by the base blockchain layer. BTCPay Server will be a better option if you’d like to accept payments via these additional layers built on top of Bitcoin such as the Lightning Network and Liquid.