We recently performed a study of Venmo social payments data from last year that uncovered some interesting trends and insights into how people are using their phones to pay for things with their friends. One of the reports we found most compelling was a categorization of all social payments made on Venmo over the last year. While there were thousands of different ways people used Venmo, a few categories made up the majority of payments.
Based on these findings, we’re working on some new features that should make Venmo even easier and more fun to use for these popular activities. Look forward to seeing some new releases very soon, but for now, enjoy perusing the most popular payment categories of 2010.
Most Popular Payment Categories
1. Food & Drink
Popular in this category:
lunch, coffee, dinner, beer, pizza, sushi, thai, sandwich,
tacos, brunch, burger, burrito, wine, and tea
How much did you spend on tacos last year?
2. Going Out
Popular in this category:
tonight, tickets, party, bar, weekend, movie, and wedding
Given that these payments were made for the most part from mobile devices, we were surprised tix were not more popular than tickets.
3. Household
Popular in this category:
rent, groceries, utilities, cleaning, comcast, cable,
electric, laundry, and internet
These household payments (eg, comcast ) are probably the most utilitarian of Venmo payments. Paying for cable somehow is just not as exciting as paying for a party.
4. Travel
Popular in this category:
gas, get a ride, car, ski trip, bus, and taxi/cab
Some of our personal favorite travel expenses: gas and tolls. You can make these payments from the passenger’s seat and you don’t have to worry about the driver tyring to graciously refuse your contribution.
Top Meals Split
Splitting meals was an incredibly popular social payment among Venmo users, with the most frequent being lunch.