Bre-B: Colombia’s instant payment system & what it means for your business

Colombia, Latin America’s third-largest digital economy, has crossed a critical threshold in its payments infrastructure. On October 6, 2025, Banco de la República — Colombia’s central bank — launched Bre-B, the country’s national interoperable instant payment system. Within three months of going live, the network had processed 370 million transactions, enrolled 33 million users, and registered 2.8 million active merchants.

Looking to enter or expand in Colombia? Bre-B represents both a structural shift in how local consumers pay and an opportunity to reach buyers previously inaccessible through conventional payment channels.

Understanding the market context

Colombia’s digital economy was forecast to surpass USD 52 billion in 2025, ranking third in Latin America after Brazil and Mexico, and is projected to reach USD 73 billion by 2028. Yet the country’s payments landscape has historically been fragmented: over 70% of transactions are still cash, and only 18% of Colombians hold a credit card.

That structural gap is exactly what Bre-B is designed to close. Modeled on Brazil’s Pix — which processed 63.4 billion transactions in 2024 alone — Bre-B applies the same core principles to the Colombian market: mandatory interoperability between all financial institutions, 24/7 availability, instant settlement, and zero consumer fees through 2029.

Bre-B Colombia adoption

The pace of Bre-B adoption has been very rapid. By January 2026 — just three months after full launch — the system had achieved the following:

These figures reflect a system that arrived with existing momentum — the result of a multi-year regulatory build-up, prior interoperability pilots, and deliberate design that built on Colombia’s existing payment infrastructure rather than replacing it.

How it works

Bre-B operates through a key-based identity system, eliminating the need to share full account numbers for any transaction. Each individual or business registers one or more unique identifiers — called llaves (keys) — linked directly to their bank account or digital wallet.

Available key types

Initiating a payment requires two inputs: the recipient’s key and the transaction amount. Settlement happens in under 20 seconds, around the clock, including weekends and public holidays. The current per-transaction limit is COP 12 million (approximately USD 3,000) — sufficient for the large majority of retail and SME transactions, with higher limits under review for subsequent phases.

Expanding functionality roadmap

What this means for merchants

Expanded addressable market

With credit card penetration at 18%, international card-based payment methods are used by a minority of Colombian consumers. Bre-B is accessible to anyone with a bank account or regulated digital wallet — a population that is exponentially larger. Enabling Bre-B doesn’t just add a payment option; it substantially expands the pool of buyers your business can convert.

Faster settlement, reduced FX exposure

Bre-B settles in real time. For merchants managing multi-currency treasury positions across Latin America, this eliminates the 2–5 day holding period associated with card settlements, reducing exposure to local currency fluctuations and improving working capital efficiency.

Lower cost of acceptance

Bre-B carries no consumer-facing transaction fees through 2029, by regulatory mandate. For merchants, the cost of acceptance is considerably lower than card network fees, particularly for high-frequency, lower-value transactions. This cost differential directly impacts unit economics, especially in competitive categories like e-commerce retail, digital goods, and financial services.

Mandatory interoperability eliminates fragmentation

Colombia’s prior digital wallet ecosystem was fragmented: Nequi operated within Bancolombia’s network, DaviPlata within Davivienda’s, and Transfiya across a subset of banks. Bre-B is fundamentally different, with legally mandated participation and interoperability. A single Bre-B integration reaches all 218+ participating institutions simultaneously. There’s no need to manage bilateral relationships or separate technical integrations per wallet provider.

Lower fraud profile than card payments

Card-not-present fraud remains a meaningful operational risk in Colombia. Bre-B’s architecture — which requires active key confirmation and device-level biometric authentication — significantly reduces the fraud surface compared to card transactions. For merchants operating in verticals with elevated chargeback exposure (forex, digital services, gaming), this is a material risk management advantage.

Bre-B vs. existing Colombian payment methods

Infrastructure & regulatory foundation

Bre-B isn’t a commercial product subject to the strategic decisions of a single provider. It’s public infrastructure, mandated, regulated, and operated by Colombia’s central bank. For merchants, this distinction carries significant practical implications.

There’s no single-party dependency, no risk of the system being withdrawn or repriced by a commercial operator, and no uncertainty about long-term availability. Banco de la República has published a formal four-year roadmap with clear milestones through 2029, and the system is supervised by the Superintendencia Financiera de Colombia (SFC) under consistent standards across all participating entities.

The central directory technology was developed in partnership with ACI Worldwide (NASDAQ: ACIW), a global leader in real-time payment infrastructure operating in more than 80 countries. This is not an experimental deployment — it’s enterprise-grade payment infrastructure backed by decades of global implementation experience.

Accepting Bre-B through PayRetailers

PayRetailers is a payment gateway purpose-built for Latin America, connecting global merchants to 300+ local payment methods across the region through a single API integration. Bre-B is now part of that network, available for Colombia alongside Nequi, DaviPlata, PSE, and international card schemes.

For merchants already operating through the PayRetailers platform, Bre-B can be enabled for Colombian customers through their existing API integration — no additional technical work required.

What PayRetailers integration offers

Single API, full market access. There’s no need to build a separate Bre-B integration, establish direct acquiring relationships with Colombian banks, or manage bilateral technical dependencies. PayRetailers handles the full infrastructure layer, including local acquiring, regulatory compliance, and settlement management.

Dynamic checkout localization. Colombian users are automatically presented with Bre-B as a payment option at checkout, alongside other relevant local methods, without additional development effort. Payment method display is dynamically configured by country and user profile.

Unified reporting across LatAm. The PayRetailers dashboard consolidates transaction data across all Latin American markets — approval rates, settlement status, chargeback volumes, and risk indicators — enabling data-driven operational decisions without managing multiple reporting environments.

Regulatory compliance, handled. PayRetailers is fully compliant with SFC requirements in Colombia and maintains on-the-ground operational teams in Bogotá. As Bre-B’s functionality expands across its roadmap — such as QR merchant payments, recurring transactions, and government payments — those capabilities become available to merchants through the same integration, without independent compliance monitoring or technical rework.

Real-time risk management. PayRetailers’ fraud and risk layer monitors transactions in real time, applying scoring models adapted to Colombian market patterns and flagging anomalies before they result in operational losses.

Priority verticals for Bre-B activation

These business types have the highest immediate opportunity to benefit from Bre-B adoption:

Strategic assessment

Bre-B is live, at scale, and accelerating. With now nearly 35 million registered users, 2.8 million active merchants, and week-on-week transaction growth of 29%, the system has already moved beyond the adoption phase. It’s becoming the default transaction rail for Colombia’s digital economy.

Merchants that integrate now will establish a presence on the rail before market saturation. Those who delay will face an increasingly competitive environment where Bre-B acceptance is a must rather than a differentiator.