Square has announced today a new product called Square Bitcoin, which the company describes as a “fully integrated” bitcoin payments and wallet solution.

Bitcoin Payments will allow sellers to accept bitcoin payments directly from their point-of-sale with no processing fees for the first year, and for a 1% fee per transaction starting on Jan. 1, 2027. That’s about half of the fees associated with accepting credit card payments, according to Willem Avé, head of product at Square.

A consumer will have the option to choose what bitcoin wallet they want to use, and then scan a QR code to use it to pay, according to Avé. Sellers can then choose to sell that via Fiat or Bitcoin, he added.

Bitcoin Payments will go live in the United States on November 10, except for in New York, where Square Bitcoin will not be available.

The news is significant in that it represents another example of bitcoin becoming more mainstream. It is more popular than ever, reaching an all-time high of 126,000 USD on October 6.

Square claims that its new Square Bitcoin offering is the “first” of its kind, meaning that it contends that its offering will be more of an integrated experience for sellers than what currently exists.

“They could send and receive, but that usually introduces all sorts of reconciliation challenges for sellers,”  Avé said. “One of the benefits of having kind of an integrated bitcoin wallet and integrated Square dashboard is that you can manage your digital finances and digital currency, along with all your other business finances” in one place.

Cryptocurrency payment users in the United States are expected to grow by 82.1% between 2024 and 2026,  “driven by crypto-friendly regulatory changes and payment provider expansion” such as this one, according to Emarketer. However, eMarketer also predicts that usage will remain niche, reaching just 2.6% of the population.

Besides allowing sellers to accept bitcoin payments, Square unveiled Bitcoin Conversions, which automatically can convert up to 50% of their daily card sales into bitcoin. That product is already available to “eligible” US-based sellers. And Bitcoin Wallet, which is built natively Square, lets sellers manage their bitcoin alongside the rest of their finances, giving them the ability to buy, sell, hold and withdrawal functionality within their dashboard.  

“Square has always stood for being able to accept any sort of tender that comes across the counter…and we believe that Block has built one of the best bitcoin stacks on the planet – it’s used to power CashApp and some of our other lines,” said Avé, in an interview with This Week in Fintech. “What we’re hearing from consumers and sellers is that there is an interest to use bitcoin for savings or treasury. So we believe that taking technology that might have just been withheld to the Wall Streets or the big companies, and giving that technology to SMBs is a democratization that helps us achieve our mission of economic empowerment.”