Reserve Bank of India
The RBI said it would launch a retail digital rupee on 1 December 2022 for a closed user group of customers and merchants, starting with four banks in four cities.
- Status
- Live
- Announced
- (announcement)
- Stage
- Pilot
- Chain or network
- unknown
- Participants
- State Bank of India, ICICI Bank, Yes Bank, IDFC First Bank, Bank of Baroda, Union Bank of India, HDFC Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank
- Next review
Scorecard
As of the review on . Changes since the previous review are marked. How pilots are scored
| Ledger | Unknown |
|---|---|
| Settlement | CBDC on the ledger |
| Access | Open (was Whitelisted institutions or investors) |
| Legal standing | Token is the legal record |
| Scale | Sustained |
What they said they would do
- MetLaunch on 1 December 2022 with four banks in Mumbai, New Delhi, Bengaluru and Bhubaneswar. (by )
- MetAdd four more banks, and extend to Ahmedabad, Gangtok, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Indore, Kochi, Lucknow, Patna and Shimla.
Decisions
Expanded
RBI proposed programmability, so that government agencies can make payments for defined benefits, and an offline function for areas with poor connectivity.
Source: rbi.org.in
Expanded
Non-bank payment system operators were made eligible to offer e₹-R wallets.
Source: rbi.org.in
Review history
Live Pilot
Annual report 2022-23 confirms the launch in the four cities for a closed user group, with ₹5.70 crore of e₹-R in circulation at 31 March 2023. Access is whitelisted because only enrolled customers and merchants could use it.
Evidence: rbi.org.in, rbi.org.in
Live Pilot
The pilot reached 15 banks and 81 locations and became interoperable with UPI QR codes. e₹-R in circulation rose to ₹234.04 crore at 31 March 2024. Regular published figures move scale to sustained.
Evidence: rbi.org.in, rbi.org.in
Live Pilot
By end-March 2025 the pilot had 17 banks and 60 lakh users, offline and programmable payments were being tested, and non-banks could offer wallets. Odisha used e₹ to pay about 88,000 Subhadra Yojana beneficiaries. e₹-R in circulation was ₹1,016.46 crore at 31 March 2025.
Evidence: rbi.org.in, rbi.org.in, rbi.org.in
Live Pilot
19 banks and some non-banks now offer wallets to users across the country, so access moves to open. In April 2026 the RBI reported 1 crore users and about 15 crore transactions worth about ₹34,000 crore to date. Circulation fell to ₹771.7 crore at 31 March 2026. The RBI still calls it a pilot, so stage stays pilot.
Evidence: rbi.org.in, rbi.org.in, rbi.org.in, rbi.org.in, rbi.org.in
What was announced
On 29 November 2022 the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) announced a retail digital rupee (e₹-R) pilot from 1 December 2022. It would run in a closed user group (CUG) of customers and merchants: four banks in Mumbai, New Delhi, Bengaluru and Bhubaneswar first, then four more banks and nine more cities. The e₹-R is a digital token representing legal tender, issued in the same denominations as notes and coins and held in bank wallets for person-to-person and person-to-merchant payments.
How it works
The RBI issues e₹-R and distributes it through banks, and since April 2024 through some non-bank payment operators. Users hold it in a mobile wallet and pay by QR code, including Unified Payments Interface (UPI) codes. The token is an RBI liability, so legal is native and settlement is cbdc. The RBI has not said what ledger it uses, so ledger stays unknown. Programmability lets a sponsor such as a state government restrict what the money can buy, by merchant type or expiry date.
Record so far
The launch met its first claim. The 2023-24 annual report (para VI.43) records 15 banks and 81 locations, which meets the expansion claim. In February 2024 the RBI proposed programmability and offline payments, and in April 2024 opened wallets to non-banks.
Year-end e₹-R in circulation went from ₹5.70 crore (March 2023) to ₹234.04 crore (March 2024) and ₹1,016.46 crore (March 2025), then fell to ₹771.7 crore (March 2026). Users rose from 60 lakh (March 2025) to 7 million (October 2025) and 1 crore (April 2026). State governments in Gujarat, Puducherry, Chandigarh, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh have paid subsidies in programmable e₹.
The status is ambiguous in the RBI’s own words. At the August 2026 press conference a Deputy Governor said e₹ carries real transactions and is a pilot “only for name’s sake”, but also that it keeps the label while the RBI tests technology and adoption. The Scorecard keeps stage at pilot until the RBI drops the label.
What to watch
An RBI decision to drop the pilot label, which would move stage to production. Whether the fall in circulation in 2025-26 continues. Any disclosure of the ledger design.