# Pix
> Source: https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/standards/pix
> research date 2026-05-28 · extracted at 2026-10-06
> Publisher: Barcoder — encyclopedia of QR, barcode and payment-code standards
Specifications:
- [Pix — Banco Central do Brasil](https://www.bcb.gov.br/en/financialstability/pix_en)
- [EMV QR Code Specifications — EMVCo](https://www.emvco.com/emv-technologies/qr-codes/)
- [Pix API — BCB GitHub (specification)](https://github.com/bacen/pix-api)
## Overview
Pix is the Brazilian Central Bank's instant payment system, launched on **16 November 2020** [1][1], [2][2]. Funds settle 24/7/365 in under ten seconds, free for individuals and at ~0.33 % for merchants [1][1]. As of late 2025 it had **178 million users — about 91 % of Brazilian adults** [1][1], [3][3]. The payload that travels in a Pix QR code is the **BR Code**, an EMVCo Merchant-Presented Mode (MPM) profile published by the BCB [4][4], [5][5]. At the 5-year mark (Nov 2025) Pix approached **~7.9 billion transactions per month** (first single month past 7 B in December 2025), with **cumulative ~196 billion transactions since launch** and an **annual run-rate near USD 6.7 trillion** — more than combined Brazilian credit + debit card volume [6][6], [7][7]. **Pix P2B (merchant) volume surpassed Pix P2P for the first time in September 2025** (44 % P2B vs 43 % P2P), marking the rail's transition from consumer-to-consumer convenience layer to dominant retail-payment rail [7][7].
## History
The Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) created an internal working group called *Pagamentos Instantâneos* in May 2018, during Michel Temer's administration, to design what would become Pix [1][1]. The system was publicly announced in February 2019 [1][1], [2][2] and was launched on a restricted-trial basis on 3 November 2020 for 1–5 % of bank customers, then opened to the general public on 16 November 2020 [1][1]. The project was carried forward by then-BCB president Roberto Campos Neto under the Bolsonaro administration [1][1].
The Central Bank's stated objectives were: reduce reliance on cash, increase financial inclusion, spur competition in a concentrated banking sector dominated by five large banks, and modernise the national payment system [2][2], [8][8]. Adoption outpaced every forecast — Pix reached 150 million users (≈ 70 % of the adult population) within four years [7][7] and ~178 million users by mid-2025 [1][1].
Recent additions to the system:
- **November 2022**: Pix Saque + Pix Troco (cash withdrawal at merchants) [2][2].
- **June 2025**: launch of **Pix Automático** — recurring authorised payments for subscriptions, utilities, school fees and rent. Targets the ~60 % of Brazilians without a credit card [9][9], [10][10].
- **2025 (rolling out)**: **Pix Internacional** — partnerships to enable cross-border Pix payments to Argentina, Uruguay, and the United States [10][10].
## Technical specification
The Pix QR code is called **BR Code**. It is a Brazilian profile of the **EMVCo Consumer-Presented / Merchant-Presented QR Code Specification** [4][4], [5][5] — the same EMVCo framework that underpins SGQR (Singapore), DuitNow (Malaysia), and other national QR-payment standards.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Payload format | EMVCo TLV (Tag-Length-Value) text string |
| Integrity check | CRC-16/CCITT-FALSE appended as field `63` [4][4] |
| Identifying GUI | `br.gov.bcb.pix` (inside the merchant-account-information template at tag `26`) [4][4] |
| Underlying symbology | [QR Code](https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/standards/qr-code) (ISO/IEC 18004) |
| Currency code | 986 (BRL — Brazilian Real) [4][4] |
| Country code | BR [4][4] |
**Two QR code variants** [4][4], [11][11]:
- **Static BR Code** — encodes the recipient's Pix key (and optionally a fixed amount). Reusable. Suited to a printed sticker at a market stall or a tip jar.
- **Dynamic BR Code** — encodes a URL that resolves (via JWT) to a per-transaction payload containing the amount, due date, identification (`txid`), and optional fines / discounts / expiry. Suited to invoices and e-commerce.
**Pix Keys** (account identifiers) [1][1]:
- **CPF** — individual tax ID
- **CNPJ** — business tax ID
- **Email address**
- **Mobile phone number** (with country code)
- **EVP** — random UUID, for users who want a key that isn't personally identifying
**Transaction types supported** [1][1]:
- P2P (person-to-person)
- P2B (person-to-business)
- B2B (business-to-business)
- P2G (person-to-government)
- B2G (business-to-government)
## Use cases
Pix is a national payment rail, so the use cases are broad and the numbers are large:
- **Person-to-person transfers** — instant, free, replacing cash and bank transfers for everyday splitting of bills, paying friends [1][1].
- **Retail point of sale** — static QR stickers at small merchants (food trucks, market stalls); dynamic QR at modern POS terminals. P2B volume grew 94 % YoY in 2024 — the fastest-growing Pix use case [7][7].
- **E-commerce checkout** — dynamic BR Code generated server-side per cart; customer scans with their banking app. Pix has overtaken cards as the dominant online-checkout method for many Brazilian merchants [7][7].
- **Business-to-business settlement** — December 2024 B2B Pix volume exceeded R$1 trillion (~USD 200 billion), 56 % YoY growth [7][7].
- **Government tax and benefit payments** — P2G and B2G [1][1].
- **Recurring billing** — Pix Automático (since June 2025) for subscriptions, rent, utilities — explicitly designed to extend recurring-payment access to the ~60 % of Brazilians without a credit card [9][9], [10][10].
- **Cash withdrawal** — Pix Saque / Pix Troco lets a customer withdraw cash from a participating merchant during a payment [2][2].
## Implementations
The Pix BR Code is text-based and the underlying [QR Code](https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/standards/qr-code) symbology is supported by every QR library, so most "Pix libraries" focus on building / validating the EMVCo TLV payload rather than the QR rendering.
**Encoders / decoders:**
- **TypeScript / JavaScript** — [thalesog/pix-utils][12] — 92★, active 2025. Parses BR Code strings back to structured payment data, generates static + dynamic codes, exports Base64 PNG [12][12].
- **Python** — [cleitonleonel/pypix][13] — 58★, 2021. Generates static + dynamic BR Code QR codes with visual customisation [13][13].
- **JavaScript** — `hiagodotme/gpix`, `gjmolter/pix-charge`, `gab618/pix-js`, `ogilvieira/pixbrasil` — smaller libraries focused on minimal BR-Code generation [14][14].
**Official reference:** the BCB publishes its API and message schemas on GitHub at [bacen/pix-api][15] — this is the canonical source for participants integrating with the Pix instant-payment network (not just the QR code) [15][15].
## Comparison
**vs. [UPI QR](https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/standards/upi-qr) (India's Unified Payments Interface)** — Both are central-bank-driven national instant payment rails launched in the same era; both have crossed 100B+ annual transactions. UPI uses a `upi://pay?pa=...&am=...` URL inside the QR rather than EMVCo TLV; Pix uses the international EMVCo MPM format. UPI is multi-bank-app from day one (any UPI app can pay any UPI handle); Pix similarly works across all banks via Pix keys but with a different naming convention (Pix key vs UPI VPA). Pix charges merchants ~0.33 %; UPI is free for all parties [1][1], [7][7].
**vs. [EPC QR / Stuzza](https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/standards/epc-qr) (European EPC QR / Girocode)** — Both are bank-issued QR payment standards. EPC QR carries a SEPA Credit Transfer initiation; Pix carries an instant-payment initiation against the Pix network. EPC QR is text-line based (BCD format with newline-separated fields); BR Code is EMVCo TLV. Pix has dynamic QR codes with per-transaction amount and metadata; EPC QR is essentially always static [5][5].
The BR Code's choice of EMVCo TLV (instead of a custom BCB-only format) is what makes Pix consumable by international wallets like Revolut and Wise — both implement EMVCo TLV parsing already for other markets [[hub3-ref]].
## Fun facts
In Q4 2024, Pix transaction volume was **80 % higher than the combined total of Brazilian credit and debit card transactions** [7][7]. In other words, a five-year-old free payment network surpassed the entire incumbent card-payment infrastructure within five years of launch.
Pix's growth trajectory is the steepest of any national real-time payment system on record — comparable launches (UPI in India, FedNow in the US, FPS in the UK) all took at least a decade to reach a fraction of Pix's per-capita transaction volume [3][3], [16][16]. The BCB attributes the speed of adoption to three deliberate design choices: free for individuals, mandatory participation for banks with >500k customers, and a single national addressing system (Pix keys) that doesn't require knowing the recipient's bank or account number [1][1], [8][8].
## Status
**Active and rapidly expanding.** Pix processed **63.4 billion transactions worth ~USD 4.6 trillion in 2024**, a 53 % YoY increase in both volume and value [7][7]. EBANX projects ~8 billion monthly transactions by end of 2025, with total annual volume of USD 6.7 trillion (a further 34 % YoY) [16][16]. Recent feature additions (Pix Automático June 2025, ongoing Pix Internacional rollout) signal continued investment by the BCB rather than maintenance mode.
No successor or deprecation planned. International influence: the BCB is actively in talks with foreign central banks about Pix as a reference implementation for new instant-payment systems [3][3].
## Sources
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pix_(payment_system)
[2]: https://www.europeanpaymentscouncil.eu/news-insights/insight/pix-latest-updates-brazils-leading-instant-payment-scheme
[3]: https://www.elibrary.imf.org/view/journals/002/2023/289/article-A004-en.xml
[4]: https://dev.to/woovi/how-does-pix-qrcode-work-5e3k
[5]: https://www.emvco.com/emv-technologies/qr-codes/
[6]: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250121148825/en/Pix-Transactions-Exceed-6-Billion-Monthly
[7]: https://paymentscmi.com/insights/pix-in-brazil-latest-statistics-central-bank/
[8]: https://insights.ebanx.com/en/resources/payments-explained/pix-instant-payment-system/
[9]: https://www.pymnts.com/news/payments-innovation/2025/pix-automatico-debut-opens-brazils-recurring-payments-market-to-millions/
[10]: https://mobileecosystemforum.com/2025/06/03/brazils-payment-revolution-accelerates-pix-automatico-launches/
[11]: https://developers.pismo.io/pismo-docs/docs/pix-and-qr-codes
[12]: https://github.com/thalesog/pix-utils
[13]: https://github.com/cleitonleonel/pypix
[14]: https://github.com/topics/brcode
[15]: https://github.com/bacen/pix-api
[16]: https://business.ebanx.com/en/press-room/press-releases/pix-to-approach-8-billion-monthly-transactions-as-it-marks-five-year-milestone-ebanx-study-finds
[hub3-ref]: https://docs.barcoder.ai/source/standards/hub3
1. [Pix (payment system) — Wikipedia][1]
2. [Pix: latest updates on Brazil's instant payment scheme — European Payments Council][2]
3. [Pix: Brazil's Successful Instant Payment System — IMF Staff Country Report 2023][3]
4. [How does Pix QRCode work? — DEV Community (Woovi)][4]
5. [EMV QR Code Specifications — EMVCo][5]
6. [Pix Transactions Exceed 6 Billion Monthly — Business Wire][6]
7. [Pix in Brazil: Latest Statistics — paymentscmi][7]
8. [PIX explained — EBANX][8]
9. [Pix Automatico Debut Opens Brazil's Recurring Payments Market — PYMNTS][9]
10. [PIX Automático Launches — Mobile Ecosystem Forum][10]
11. [Pix and QR Codes — Pismo Developers][11]
12. [thalesog/pix-utils — GitHub][12]
13. [cleitonleonel/pypix — GitHub][13]
14. [GitHub topic: brcode][14]
15. [bacen/pix-api — official BCB API repo][15]
16. [Pix to approach 8 billion monthly transactions — EBANX press release][16]
## Deployments
Found in the following country reports (grep across `reports/countries/`):
- **BR** — [BR-brazil.md](https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/payments/BR)
- **CO** — [CO-colombia.md](https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/payments/CO)
- **CR** — [CR-costa-rica.md](https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/payments/CR)
- **UY** — [UY-uruguay.md](https://docs.barcoder.ai/docs/payments/UY)