Samsung’s latest payment app, which comes in the form of Samsung Pay Mini, is expected to directly compete with Google’s Android Pay when the former service is officially launched. This is due to the fact that both Samsung Pay Mini and Android Pay are quite similar in the way the two services work. Samsung Pay Mini has the capability to work with any Android smartphone which comes with Android 5.0 Lollipop or higher, while Android Pay is able to run on Android smartphones running on Android 4.4 KitKat and above.
It is also rumored that Samsung and Google are planning on testing their respective payment services in South Korea soon. However, the competition is expected to become tougher once LG launches their own payment service, which will likely come in the form of LG Pay. Before this, Samsung only had Samsung Pay and it is currently supported by a limited number of Samsung devices, which includes the Galaxy S7 family, Galaxy S6 family, Galaxy Note 5, Galaxy A5 and Galaxy A7. Samsung Pay Mini on the other hand, supports Android devices of other brands. However, to be able to use Samsung Pay Mini, your device has to come with Android 5.0 Lollipop or higher and come equipped with a HD display or better. Samsung Pay Mini supports most Samsung Pay features, including online payment and more. One feature which is available on Samsung Pay and not on Samsung Pay Mini, is the offline payment option.
Samsung’s Pay Mini competitor, Android Pay, was launched by Google a couple of years back but it is currently available in a limited number of countries. It was first launched in the US, and it is currently available in the UK, Singapore, Australia, Japan, Hong Kong and most recently in Poland. Like Samsung Pay Mini, it can be used on Android devices from other manufacturers but Android 4.4 KitKat is a requirement. Another smartphone-based payment service is LG Pay, which is expected to be launched in Barcelona later this month and it will be similar to Samsung Pay. LG initially planned to launch its payment service last year, but had to delay the launch due to issues faced when testing the service in South Korea.