BEYOND QRIS ADOPTION: CONVERTING DIGITAL PAYMENT ACCESS INTO SCALABLE MSME OUTCOMES IN INDONESIA

Abstract

This study examines whether the rapid expansion of Indonesia’s Quick Response Code Indonesian Standard (QRIS) has created the conditions required for micro, small, and medium enterprise (MSME) scalability. It integrates national indicators for 2020–2025, provincial merchant distribution as of 30 June 2025, quarterly consumer adoption, and QRIS transaction volume and value. A quantitative descriptive-correlational and policy-diagnostic design is employed using trend analysis, year-on-year growth rates, exploratory Pearson correlations, the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index, the Gini coefficient, and a provincial merchant-ecosystem typology.

The findings show that registered QRIS merchants increased from 13 million in 2020 to 43 million in 2025, while consumer users reached approximately 60 million by the fourth quarter of 2025. In the second quarter of 2025, QRIS processed 1.19 billion transactions worth Rp110 trillion, representing year-on-year growth of 141 percent in volume and 111 percent in value. Merchant expansion was strongly associated with MSME credit and financial literacy, although the short annual series and estimated 2025 MSME values preclude causal interpretation. Provincial adoption was also highly concentrated: the ten largest provincial networks accounted for 79.41 percent of merchants, with an HHI of approximately 1,048 and a Gini coefficient of 0.685.

The study contributes an access–usage–capability–scale framework that distinguishes merchant registration from productive digital empowerment. It concludes that QRIS provides essential payment infrastructure, but MSME scalability depends on active usage, financial-management capability, responsible financing, merchant protection, consent-based data governance, and regionally differentiated implementation.