Banks in Qatar and how online payments reach your account

The eight Qatari national banks

Qatar Central Bank’s 2025 annual report refers to eight national banks. Four are conventional and four are Islamic. Foreign bank branches such as HSBC and Standard Chartered also operate in Qatar.

Two names still appear on older lists but no longer exist as banks: International Bank of Qatar (now part of Dukhan Bank) and Al Khalij Commercial Bank (now part of Masraf Al Rayan). Qatar Development Bank is a state development bank, not a retail bank.

Three roles a bank plays behind your checkout

How settlement works in Qatar

When a customer pays by card, the acquirer collects the funds from the card issuer, deducts the agreed fees and pays the balance into your settlement account on the provider’s cycle. Domestic Himyan transactions route through the national NAPS network operated by Qatar Central Bank; international-scheme cards route through Visa or Mastercard.

When a customer pays by Fawran, the money moves directly from their bank account to yours in real time; there is no acquirer in the middle.

Whichever rail you use, ask three questions before signing: how often settlement runs, whether the payout report itemises every transaction and fee, and whether refunds are netted from the next payout or debited separately. Those three answers decide how much reconciliation work your finance team inherits.

Who is allowed to process payments: QCB licensing

Qatar Central Bank’s Payment Services Regulation, in force since September 2021, requires any entity providing payment services in or from Qatar to hold a QCB licence. That covers e-money issuance, merchant acquiring, fund transfers, payment gateways, settlement services and ATM operation. Banks already licensed by QCB do not need a separate payment services licence. A companion Information and Cyber Security Regulation for payment service providers was issued in 2022.

QCB’s 2025 annual report lists 14 licensed fintechs: nine in merchant acquiring (Pay2M, Noqoody, SkipCash, MyFatoorah, Dibsy, Sadad, 7sab, Tess Payments and Tap), three e-money issuers (iPay, Ooredoo Money and CWallet) and two buy-now-pay-later providers. In 2025 QCB also allowed the first fintech, Sadad, to integrate directly with the NAPS network and the QPAY e-commerce gateway, and began opening direct real-time gross settlement access to payment service providers.

When you compare providers, ask which QCB licence they hold or which licensed acquirer or bank they process through. A platform can be legitimate without holding its own licence, but you should know whose licence your money moves under.

How much moves through these rails

QCB publishes monthly payment statistics. For December 2025 it reported point-of-sale transactions of QAR 9.9 billion and e-commerce transactions of QAR 4.7 billion across 11.8 million online transactions, a combined QAR 14.7 billion, up 7.4% year on year. Fawran carried about QAR 5.1 billion in the same month. Those figures, not third-party market-size estimates, are the reliable baseline for planning.

Where Rapid Gateway fits

Rapid Gateway is launching in Qatar as a payment platform for online businesses: card acceptance with 3-D Secure, local bank and QR payment methods, settlement in Qatari Riyal to your business bank account with itemised reports, plus invoicing, WhatsApp commerce, CRM and a merchant portal. Businesses on the waiting list receive priority onboarding and 3 months of discounted pricing after going live.

Frequently asked questions