Do you use a digital wallet?
More and more people do use them, as a way to store shopping tools, like credit cards and debit cards, that have always been found in traditional wallets. Other important documents can also be kept in digital wallets.
The tech may be impressive, but how many people actually use digital wallets, and for what range of situations and services? As reported here, there are apparently generational differences, including some that may be counterintuitive.
Based on interviews with 2,059 consumers, the report found that 90% of millennials (age 28-43) and 89% of Gen Z (age 12-27) have used at least one mobile wallet feature. Baby Boomers (age 60-79) and “seniors” (age 80+) lag far behind — only 49% have used at least one mobile wallet feature.
That might be expected, given the normal stereotype of “older” adults not being all that tech-savvy.
But it’s not that simple. It turns out there are differences in what kinds of documents or other assets the different generations are willing to keep in a digital wallet, and how strongly they feel that digital wallets can eventually replace physical ones.
Will digital wallets replace physical wallets?
Despite not actually using them as much as younger generations, 84% of Boomers and seniors say, “Yes.” This lines up with Gen X, where 89% say so. But for Gen Z, for all that they are heavy users, only 51% say mobile wallets can replace physical ones.
Are there generational differences as to what goes into the digital wallet?
Yes.
Boomers and seniors track with Gen X and Millennials for storing event tickets in a mobile wallet — all groups are in the low 40% range. For Gen Z, only 31% store event tickets.
The trend is even stronger for airline boarding passes. 48.4% of boomers and senors have stored an airline boarding pass in a mobile wallet in the past 12 months — a higher percentage than any other age group. Gen X comes closest at 45%, while Millennials and Gen Z don’t reach 40%.
On the other hand, Boomers and seniors trail all other age groups in storing their health insurance cards in their mobile wallet. Only 31% do so, while Millennials top the list at over 45%.
But Boomers and seniors top the list for storing their vaccine cards in their mobile wallets. Just over 40% have done so in the past 12 months, more than any other group. Gen Z trails at 26%.
Where boomers and seniors consistently lag behind the other groups is with items that are perhaps more easy to imagine as being on paper: bus or public transit passes; hunting, fishing or other recreational permits or passes; train tickets. In all these categories, boomers and seniors are below 10% — half the rate of Gen Z.
The fact that the numbers jump around, category by category, proves our contention that the notion that boomers and seniors are not tech-savvy is ludicrous: their usage of tech is driven not by fear of it or unwillingness to try it, but pragmatic considerations as to what they need in a given situation, what works for them, what benefits them. Where there are benefits, they are just as eager, and as capable of jumping on board, as the supposedly more tech-savvy younger generations. It is factually wrong — and, we suggest, ageist — to believe otherwise.