Apple Pay is at last "coming soon" to Germany, according to the company's website, though it has less than two months to fulfill a 2018 launch date it promised earlier in the year.
The news can also be seen on the website of HypoVereinsbank, one of several banks planning support the platform. According to Apple, some other participating card issuers will include Boon, Bunq, ComDirect, Edenred, Fidor, Hanseatic Bank, N26, and O2 Banking. American Express, Mastercard, and Visa cards should be compatible.
Some of the better-known retailers that will accept Apple Pay are Aldi, Galeria Kaufhof, H&M, Lidl, MediaMarkt, Saturn, Shell, and Zara. In Berlin, BVG will let U- and S-Bahn riders pay for passes.
Germany is continental Europe's biggest economy, which has made the absence of Apple Pay there conspicuous. Apple and banks have been mired in talks for well over a year, presumably in an attempt to sort out transaction fees. Apple takes a fractional cut from each Apple Pay transaction, eating into a bank's revenues on a large enough scale.
Apple Pay is rumored to be coming to another European market, Belgium, sometime later this month.
In announcing its September quarter results Apple revealed that Apple Pay transactions tripled year-over-year through a combination of more regions and compatible vendors.