Apple Pay adds issuers L&N Federal Credit Union, UW Credit Union and M&T Bank

The latest Apple Pay adopters were announced through an Apple Support webpage that holds a rolling list of participating issuers. With the three additions, Apple Pay is now supported by 21 issuing banks in the U.S.

Today's news comes one month to the day after Navy Federal — the world's largest credit union — U.S. Bank, USAA, PNC Bank, and Barclaycard announced Apple Pay integration in a second wave of rollouts. Apple revealed Apple Pay in September and activated the NFC-based iPhone payments system with an October iOS update.

Although solid statistics are few and far between, most signs point to a successful launch. Apple CEO Tim Cook said more than one million cards were activated with Apple Pay in its first 72 hours of availability, dwarfing competing solutions like Google Wallet.

With a strong start, Apple Pay continues to attract partner banks, while related services have also voiced interest in getting in on the action. For example, Square CEO Jack Dorsey said last month that his company plans to start accepting Apple's NFC solution with new point-of-sale hardware expected to ship in 2015. Previously thought to be a competitor in the payments market, Dorsey said Square is more focused on POS technology than issuing credit cards or building alternative payment systems.