Thunes review: products, technology and pricing (2026)

Thunes runs a cross-border payments network that connects businesses to wallets, bank accounts and cards in other countries, and also lets them collect local payment methods, all through one API. Its distinguishing feature is the Direct Global Network, a set of direct connections to receiving institutions that Thunes pairs with its own FX, treasury and compliance tooling.

Thunes describes itself as headquartered in Singapore. Customers, which it calls Members, include banks, neobanks, mobile wallets, payment service providers, money transfer operators and gig-economy platforms. It sits in the same broad space as Nium, and other cross-border providers include Wise and Airwallex; see the Nium vs Thunes comparison.

At a glance

How the platform works

A business integrates once with Thunes and then reaches many destinations through that single connection. Thunes says the Direct Global Network links it to more than 720 Members in over 140 countries (Direct Global Network page, last modified 8 October 2026). Instead of chaining correspondent banks, a payout is routed over Thunes' own connection to the institution that holds the recipient's wallet, account or card.

Four layers sit behind the API, according to the company's solutions page:

• Network: the direct connections that deliver funds in real time where the destination supports it.
• SmartX Treasury: FX and liquidity management, quoted by Thunes across 90 currencies.
• Fortress Compliance: screening and risk controls built into the payment flow.
• Single API: one integration covering Pay, Accept, treasury and compliance.

On payout speed, Thunes says 85% of mobile transactions settle in real time and quotes 99.99% platform uptime. Those figures sit on the network page without an as-of date, so treat them as company claims.

Products

Pay

Pay covers payouts to mobile wallets, bank accounts and neobanks, cards and stablecoin wallets. Thunes says the network reaches 4 billion mobile and stablecoin wallets, 8 billion bank accounts and 15 billion cards (network page, undated). Other Thunes pages from 2026 quote slightly different totals, such as 12 billion wallets and accounts in the Fiserv release of 17 August 2026, so the exact reach depends on the page and date.

Accept

Accept lets a merchant collect through local wallets, bank payments, digital vouchers and buy now, pay later. The Accept API describes two integration modes: a redirect to a Thunes-hosted payment page, or a host-to-host mode where the merchant handles payment details itself. Cards and BNPL support a separate charge step after authorisation, and refunds and cancellations depend on the method.

Business Payments

Thunes launched Business Payments on 22 April 2025 for Members that serve companies. At launch it offered local-currency supplier payments in more than 30 currencies across over 50 countries via local ACH, USD payouts to more than 170 countries, and real-time funding with USDC.

SmartX Treasury and Fortress Compliance

These are the supporting layers rather than separate purchases. SmartX gives visibility of where funds sit and what the recipient will receive. Fortress is the compliance layer that Thunes cites when describing its licensing and risk controls.

Developer experience and integrations

Thunes publishes API documentation at docs.thunes.com, with separate references for Money Transfer (v1 and v2) and Accept (v1). Both use HTTP Basic Authentication, with an API key and secret issued after an initial compliance review, and are reachable over HTTPS (TLS 1.2 or later) or IPSec VPN.

The Money Transfer v2 flow works in four steps:

1. Payers: call the payers endpoint to find destinations, limits and the required sender and beneficiary fields.
2. Quotation: lock an FX rate and see Thunes' fees; each quote has an expiry.
3. Transaction: attach sender, beneficiary and purpose, using a unique external ID.
4. Confirmation: confirm to dispatch; the source amount moves from available to pending balance.

Optional beneficiary checks (credit party information and verification) can be run first. Status changes are sent to a callback URL, and the transaction can also be polled. Thunes describes a pre-production environment for testing, with a request header that marks a transaction as simulated and an endpoint that moves it to a chosen status. The Accept API documents a sandbox and production pair, plus a callback that signals a change without including transaction details, so the integrator retrieves the order to read the outcome. Thunes says it avoids breaking changes within a major version.

Payment methods, currencies and coverage

Thunes' own pages are not consistent: one solutions page uses 130+ countries for payouts, and the 2025 releases used 130+ countries and 320+ payment methods. The more recent pages use the higher country count and a lower method count.

Pricing model

Thunes does not publish a price list on the pages we opened, and the integration page does not mention pricing. The documentation shows how cost is handled in the flow: a quotation returns the FX rate and Thunes' fees before a transaction is created, so the sender sees the cost for that payout up front. Commercial terms are agreed with Thunes during onboarding. Not published on the company website as of 3 November 2026.

Recent launches

Regulation in brief

Thunes states that it obtained the 50 licences it needs to operate in the United States, through Thunes Financial Services LLC, and says this lets it contract directly with US businesses (release of 4 June 2025). The 2026 Fiserv release says it holds money transmission licences in all US states where required. Other jurisdictions are not itemised on the pages we opened. Our guide on how to check a financial licence explains how to verify a licence on an official register.

Who it tends to suit

Thunes is commonly used by organisations that pay out to many countries, such as wallets, remittance operators, marketplaces and platforms with gig workers, and by providers that want to add payouts under their own brand. It may also suit businesses that want local-method acceptance without building many separate integrations. Companies that mainly need multi-currency business accounts may look at Airwallex or Payoneer. More background is in our cross-border payments hub and the guide to real-time payments.