Over the past week, mobile apps from banks across Central Asia and the Caucasus rolled out 25 notable updates.
Trend of the week: Expanding contactless payment geography (Apple Pay, Faster Payments System), integrating AI assistants into credit products, and developing insurance services.
🏆 Update of the week: The official launch of Apple Pay in Kyrgyzstan’s Optima24, reporting a high percentage of successful initial connections.
🇰🇿 Kazakhstan
- Freedom SuperApp — launched MyComfort policy issuance for real estate and equipment protection with coverage up to 12 million ₸ (officially confirmed).
- bcc.kz — introduced a GPI tracker to monitor SWIFT transfers and added a tax debt check before opening a deposit.
- ForteApp — enabled card top-ups via accounts linked in Apple Wallet and added PDF receipt sharing for Astana ERC.
- ForteBusiness — simplified corporate card issuance and fixed auto-fill errors for transfer details.
- BCC Business 2.0 — added biometric identification for logins from new devices, continuing a series of payment feature updates.
- Bank RBK — fixed limit calculations for phone number transfers, maintaining a 4.90 rating across nearly 30,000 reviews.
🇺🇿 Uzbekistan
- Oson — integrated e-wallet top-ups via Russia’s Faster Payments System (SBP).
- Uzum Bank — launched a targeted 10% cashback for educational courses with partners, holding a 4.80 rating across 72,000 reviews.
- Iman — allowed users to top up existing investment accounts without opening new ones.
- Anorbank — released its third technical update of the month, focusing on credit limit displays.
🇰🇬 Kyrgyzstan
- Optima24 — officially launched contactless payments via Apple Pay (officially confirmed).
- MBank — added automatic parking payments, custom card designs, and a dedicated Islamic finance dashboard.
🇹🇯 Tajikistan
- Alif Bank — accelerated app launch times and simplified transfers by adding contact selection and scanning to the home screen.
🇦🇿 Azerbaijan
- ABB mobile — equipped built-in AI managers AI-nur and AI-khan with an “Avans” credit limit increase function.
- Birbank — simplified adding receipts to the “ƏDV geri al” VAT refund service.
- PASHA Bank — allowed clients to remotely convert a standard salary card into a co-branded Miles&Smiles card.
- UBank by Unibank — added a timer to the credit application processing screen to estimate decision times.
