No Single Rail Has Replaced Checks
More than two decades into the digital payments era, the American business-to-business payments landscape remains a patchwork of legacy and modern rails, and the data shows an industry in transition rather than one that has arrived at its destination.
The Long, Slow Decline of the Check
The clearest long-term trend is the decline of the check. According to the 2025 AFP Digital Payments Survey, sponsored by J.P. Morgan, checks now account for just 26 percent of B2B disbursements, down from 33 percent in 2022 and a dramatic fall from 81 percent in 2004. On the receivables side, the shift looks similar: businesses report that only 25 percent of incoming B2B payments now arrive by check, compared with 75 percent two decades ago. Nacha, which administers the ACH Network, called it “a new low” for paper-based disbursements and noted the decline reflects both growing comfort with digital alternatives and rising concern over check-related fraud.
Yet check usage has not disappeared, and the data on intent is more cautious than the headline trend suggests:
- 91 percent of organizations still use checks, up from 75 percent in 2023 (2025 AFP Payments Fraud and Control Survey)
- More than three-quarters say they have no immediate plans to stop
- 63 percent of organizations reported attempted or actual check fraud in 2024, making checks the payment type most exposed to fraud by a wide margin
- Federal Reserve Financial Services has flagged mail-theft-related check fraud as a particular concern, citing FinCEN data showing more than 15,000 reports in a recent six-month period, totaling over $688 million in suspicious activity
AFP’s research suggests many finance leaders may simply be more familiar with checks than with the risks they carry, while smaller suppliers often lack the systems to accept anything else.
ACH Keeps Absorbing the Shift Away from Paper
ACH remains the workhorse of electronic B2B payments and continues to post substantial growth. Nacha reports:
- Total B2B ACH volume rose 155 percent from 2015 to 2024, from 2.9 billion payments to 7.4 billion
- The value of those payments grew 105 percent over the same period, from $28.3 trillion to $58.2 trillion
- Same Day ACH, introduced in 2016, has been a meaningful driver of that growth
Cost remains a strong argument for the rail: AFP and Nacha data put the median cost of initiating or receiving an ACH payment at 26 to 50 cents, compared with $2.01 to $4.00 for a check.
Wires Still Own the High-Value End
Wire transfers continue to dominate the high-value end of B2B payments, particularly for time-sensitive or large transactions where same-day finality matters. The Clearing House’s CHIPS system processed an average of more than 535,000 payment orders per business day in 2023, with an average daily value of approximately $1.8 trillion and an average individual payment size of $3.45 million. The Federal Reserve’s Fedwire Funds Service, the other major large-value rail, typically processes roughly twice the daily value of CHIPS, underscoring how concentrated wire activity is among large corporates, financial institutions, and high-dollar transactions rather than routine vendor payments.
Cards Are the Fastest-Growing Rail, but Still a Small Slice
Commercial and virtual cards represent the fastest-growing segment of B2B payments, even though they still account for a small share of total volume:
- 2025 U.S. commercial card spend is estimated to have topped $1 trillion, driven largely by virtual card adoption
- Juniper Research projects global virtual card transaction values will reach roughly $13.8 trillion by the end of 2026, more than double 2022 levels, with B2B transactions making up the majority of that volume
- Mordor Intelligence estimates the broader virtual cards market at $6.43 trillion in 2026, growing at nearly 19 percent annually through 2031
Despite this growth, analysts at TSYS and others note that commercial cards still represent less than 3 percent of global B2B payment volume, reflecting how concentrated card use remains in specific categories such as travel, procurement, and recurring vendor spend rather than broad-based accounts payable disbursement.
Real-Time Payments: Small Today, but Building Momentum
Real-time payments are the newest entrant and, so far, the smallest by volume, but momentum is building. The Federal Reserve’s FedNow Service, launched in 2023, had grown to roughly 1,500 participating financial institutions by the end of 2025, while The Clearing House’s RTP network, in operation since 2017, now reaches financial institutions holding close to 90 percent of U.S. demand deposit accounts.
A PYMNTS Intelligence study conducted with The Clearing House found that 53 percent of businesses plan to adopt the RTP network within two years, and that businesses already using real-time rails report meaningfully higher satisfaction than non-users across cash flow, reconciliation, and supplier-relationship measures. Even so, the same research is candid that credit cards, ACH, checks, and wires still account for the bulk of B2B payment activity today, and that real-time rails remain in what one report described as “the plumbing phase,” with integration into ERP, treasury, and accounting systems cited as the biggest barrier to wider use.
Where Things Are Headed
Looking ahead, the AFP survey found that 76 percent of organizations expect to update their payments strategy within the next three years, with the leading priorities being:
- Exploration of new payment formats and channels (72 percent)
- Updates to payment file formats (40 percent)
- Development of a more comprehensive baseline payments strategy (38 percent)
Adoption of the ISO 20022 messaging standard is expected to accelerate alongside this shift, as it provides the richer remittance data that newer rails depend on. Cross-border B2B payments are also expanding, with 87 percent of organizations now initiating them, up nine percentage points since 2022.
The Bottom Line for AP and Treasury Leaders
The overall picture for finance and accounts payable leaders is one of gradual, uneven migration rather than a wholesale rail switch. Checks are shrinking but entrenched among smaller trading partners and risk-averse processes. ACH continues to absorb the largest share of the shift away from paper. Wires remain essential for high-value, time-critical transfers. Cards, especially virtual cards, are growing fastest but from a small base. And real-time rails are positioned as the next frontier, contingent on deeper integration with the financial systems businesses already run. For organizations evaluating their own payment mix, the more useful question may not be which single rail to standardize on, but how to manage an increasingly multi-rail environment without losing the controls and visibility a sound disbursement framework requires.