Venmo
Ranked 9 of 17 mobile payment apps by recommenders
Recommended for convenient, familiar money transfers among friends in the US, though critics cite sudden account bans, identity checks and public transactions by default.
Recommended for convenient, familiar money transfers among friends in the US, though critics cite sudden account bans, identity checks and public transactions by default.
34 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 13
- criticize it
- 21
- approval share
- 38%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 13 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 0.6 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 7 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Widely known and widely adopted
“I'm familiar with Venmo and Paypal, so I'd pick either of those just because they're known to me.”
Comment from 9 Jan 2026 in “Ask HN: What's your preferred digital payment method?” “The UK is missing something like Venmo with wide adoption.”
Comment from 20 May 2026 in “Goodbye Visa and Mastercard: 130M Europeans switching to sovereign payment” “Venmo, which appears to be crushing Cash App”
Comment from 24 Feb 2026 in “Stripe valued at $159B, 2025 annual letter” - Comment from 15 Jul 2026 in “Stripe, Advent offer to buy PayPal for more than $53B”
Convenient for paying people
“Makes it way easier than going around to everybody in the locker room trying to round up cash.”
Comment from 10 Mar 2026 in “Jolla on track to ship new phone with Sailfish OS, user-replaceable battery” “It's super convenient to be able to use Venmo in that situation.”
Comment from 2 Jul 2026 in “A new Android malware from Google” “Zelle or Venmo for dollar P2P transfers”
Comment from 9 Jan 2026 in “Ask HN: What's your preferred digital payment method?” Easy group collection and donations
“Pushing Venmo and Square for donations increased donations by like 30% and reduced shrink at fundraisers.”
Comment from 3 Mar 2026 in “Why payment fees matter more than you think” “Makes it way easier than going around to everybody in the locker room trying to round up cash.”
Comment from 10 Mar 2026 in “Jolla on track to ship new phone with Sailfish OS, user-replaceable battery”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Account bans and identity checks
“Venmo requires a verified account tied to your real identity, phone number, and bank account”
Comment from 2 Sep 2026 in “I don't have a smartphone or at least I wish I didn't” “Venmo did the same thing to me: They didn't tell me I was banned until they had my ID.”
Comment from 15 Apr 2026 in “Claude may require identity verification in some cases” “Venmo banned me for life because I and a friend both signed up a new account”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “PayPal discloses data breach that exposed user info for 6 months” - Comment from 5 Sep 2026 in “Why are European countries moving their gold out of North America?”
Transactions public by default
“People don't seem to know or understand their transactions are public by default.”
Comment from 10 Oct 2026 in “My personal AI agent posted my bank details on company Slack” “Apps like Venmo by default will share basically who you are spending time with”
Comment from 15 May 2026 in “OpenAI is connecting ChatGPT to bank accounts via Plaid” “Venmo, a Paypal company, publishes transaction data publicly by default”
Comment from 31 Dec 2025 in “OpenAI's cash burn will be one of the big bubble questions of 2026” - Comment from 16 Feb 2026 in “Wero – Digital payment wallet, Made in Europe”
Unpredictable fraud flags and holds
“platforms deciding you're buying drugs because you purchase and transfer out (thanks Venmo)”
Comment from 29 Oct 2026 in “Binance-hacker-1029 – $5.6B stolen from Binance” “Paypal/Venmo/CashApp, Schrödinger's fraud trigger you never know it's gonna work or not.”
Comment from 23 Jun 2026 in “Crypto in 2026: Oh, This Is the Bad Place” “Paypal and Venmo might give you the run around when it comes to your money”
Comment from 22 Dec 2025 in “The gift card accountability sink” Ads and broken login page
“The Venmo app (which Paypal owns) is jammed with crappy ads and an often-broken UI.”
Comment from 15 Jul 2026 in “Stripe, Advent offer to buy PayPal for more than $53B” “If Venmo didn't care about making their login page work well with Firefox”
Comment from 27 Aug 2026 in “The Harness Is the Thing”
Other mobile payment apps people recommend
The four most recommended other mobile payment apps, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wero | 84 | 96 | 47% | 11 | — | — |
| Apple Pay | 73 | 48 | 60% | 12 | — | — |
| Apple Wallet | 58 | 63 | 48% | 10 | — | — |
| Google Pay | 26 | 33 | 44% | 11 | — | — |
| VenmoThis page | 13 | 21 | 38% | 7 | — | — |
What people said
35 of the 38 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“platforms deciding you're buying drugs because you purchase and transfer out (thanks Venmo)”
“How are they allowed to run their billon dollar business like this?”
“Venmo make transactions public by default, which is insane.”
“People don't seem to know or understand their transactions are public by default.”
“Venmo and Zelle are American banks that just add a new type of KYC endpoint”
“Venmo requires a verified account tied to your real identity, phone number, and bank account”
“If Venmo didn't care about making their login page work well with Firefox”
“Venmo and Cashapp are good at software.”
“The Venmo app (which Paypal owns) is jammed with crappy ads and an often-broken UI.”
“it has a great amount of mindshare”
“the proliferation now of Apple/Google/Samsung Pay, Zelle, PayPal, Venmo, et al., will stave off any large-scale gouging”
“It's super convenient to be able to use Venmo in that situation.”
“Paypal/Venmo/CashApp, Schrödinger's fraud trigger you never know it's gonna work or not.”
“Banned from Venmo, absolutely no idea why.”
“apps like Venmo potentially entering the market”
“No way on PayPal,venmo, or any company associated with Paypal”
“The UK is missing something like Venmo with wide adoption.”
“Apps like Venmo by default will share basically who you are spending time with”
“I have still waiting on the Venmo even though it says PAID”
“Straight up PayPal and Venmo can go to hell.”
“The lack of accountability and transparency on these things is really bad.”
“Venmo does the same thing.”
“Venmo did the same thing to me: They didn't tell me I was banned until they had my ID.”
“Makes it way easier than going around to everybody in the locker room trying to round up cash.”
“Pushing Venmo and Square for donations increased donations by like 30% and reduced shrink at fundraisers.”
“Venmo is literally the only service I've ever used that won't accept it for 2FA”
“Venmo, which appears to be crushing Cash App”
“Venmo banned me for life because I and a friend both signed up a new account”
“by default exposes all of your transactions publicly to your "friends"”
“Venmo is useless for many of us because it is limited to the US”
“Zelle or Venmo for dollar P2P transfers”
“I'm familiar with Venmo and Paypal, so I'd pick either of those just because they're known to me.”
“Venmo, a Paypal company, publishes transaction data publicly by default”
“Paypal and Venmo might give you the run around when it comes to your money”
“they can't use venmo\cashapp, then the OS is dead in the water from day 1”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.