Revolut launches UK's first in-store biometric checkout with face-pay pilot at London coffee shops
Revolut launches UK’s first in-store biometric checkout with face-pay pilot at London coffee shops #
Revolut has begun piloting what it describes as the United Kingdom’s first in-store facial recognition payment system, letting customers pay at the till with a glance at a camera.
The three-day trial, branded Revolut Pay with Smile, started on 24 September at three London branches of specialty coffee chain Kiss the Hippo: Bloomsbury, Chelsea and Soho. It runs until 26 September. If the pilot goes well, Revolut said it plans to extend the feature to all twelve of the chain’s UK locations later this year.
The service runs through Revolut’s own point-of-sale hardware, Revolut Register. At the checkout, customers select Pay with Smile on the terminal screen and complete a facial identity check, which the company compares to unlocking a smartphone or approving a transaction in a banking app. The system cross-references a live facial scan against the identity verification a customer completed when opening their Revolut account.
According to the company, facial embeddings generated during each transaction are used only to authenticate that payment and are deleted once the check is complete. Merchants receive no personal data, and all processing takes place within Revolut’s own environment. Customers must enable the feature themselves in the Revolut app and can withdraw consent at any time. No one is enrolled by default.
To encourage merchant adoption, Revolut is waiving processing fees on every Pay with Smile transaction during the pilot. Alex Codina, general manager of merchant payments at Revolut Business, said the zero-fee offer was intended to reduce cost pressure on independent hospitality venues. He described the technology as a replacement for what he called “outdated, fragmented” till systems.
The launch comes as the UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office has published guidance on the use of biometric recognition under domestic data-protection law. Revolut has said user consent and data transparency are central to the product’s design.
Merchants taking on their first Revolut Register terminal before the end of 2026 can get 50 percent off the device, bringing the price to £349.50 plus VAT.
Copy link