14 DAY TRIAL // Samsung has officially announced the Samsung Pay Mini service for Android today in South Korea. The service isn’t limited to Samsung Galaxy smartphones, as all Android-running phones will be able to use it as long as they meet some requirements.
Samsung Pay Mini will be available in South Korea in Q1 2017 for Android smartphones running 5.0 Lollipop or higher and having a 1280 x 720 pixel resolution. The Pay Mini service will offer online payment services for Android smartphones and users will be able to access Samsung Pay services like lifestyle, membership and transportation.
Samsung Pay Mini is essentially a simplified version of Samsung Pay, but it won’t include offline payments support. Users who wish to make offline payments would need a Samsung device compatible with Samsung Pay. Customers in South Korea would get a new shopping and rewards system integrated into Samsung Pay Mini.
A pre-trial test will start on February 6 in South Korea
Samsung intends to conduct a pre-trial test on February 6 with Samsung Card in South Korea, ahead of the official launch. Samsung Card holders will be able to get a trial version of Samsung Pay Mini from the Google Play Store.
Samsung intends to offer this service to consumers in other markets, but hasn’t stated when that will happen. Most likely, users from other countries will be able to download Samsung Pay Mini in Q2 at the earliest, after the trial test ends and the app is launched in South Korea.
Samsung Pay has expanded considerably over the past few months and managed to process over 100 million transactions since it was launched over a year ago. But Samsung Pay was limited to only Galaxy smartphones. Samsung Pay Mini will work on many more Android phones, making this payments service a true competitor to Google’s Android Pay.
It’s unclear if Samsung will launch a version for iOS, considering that Apple reportedly rejected the Samsung Pay Mini iOS app a few months ago and Samsung might not plan on submitting the app for approval once again.
