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The European Central Bank has chosen 36 payment service providers to join a year‑long pilot that will test the technical and operational readiness for a potential digital euro.

Selection process and timeline

According to the ECB, the providers were selected from more than 50 applicants. The cohort “spans a broad range of business models and sizes and offers broad geographical coverage,” the announcement states. Names of the firms were not disclosed.

The pilot is slated to start in the second half of 2027.

Testing will occur at the ECB headquarters and at 19 national central banks across the euro area. Participants will be divided into two groups: distributing PSPs, which will give central bank staff access to beta digital euro services such as account set‑up and transaction execution, and acquiring PSPs, which will manage merchant relationships and enable acceptance of digital payments. Some firms may perform both roles simultaneously.

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How the trial will operate

Staff from the ECB and the participating national central banks will conduct both online and offline person‑to‑person payments, as well as person‑to‑business transactions at physical points of sale and on e‑commerce platforms. A beta version of the digital euro, technically close to the proposed legislation but without legal‑tender status, will be used throughout the test.

ECB executive board member Piero Cipollone leads the high‑level task force for the digital euro project. He said the “strong market interest” shown by the pilot reflects “the private sector’s readiness to engage actively and quickly advance with the digital euro project.” Cipollone added that the work aims to develop “a secure, efficient and inclusive digital euro.”

Earlier in April, the central bank incorporated Nexo Standards, the Berlin Group and the European Cards Payment Cooperation into the project. The Berlin Group supplies the framework for alias‑based initiation and reconciliation, while the ECPC contributes its CPACE standard for contactless acceptance.

In practice, this means merchants that already accept card payments could add the digital euro without overhauling their infrastructure. For consumers, the beta testing phase should reveal whether the new currency can be used as smoothly as existing electronic payment methods.

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The trial focuses on technical feasibility and also serves as a litmus test for regulatory readiness. The central bank will evaluate whether the current legal framework can accommodate a digital euro that functions alongside cash and traditional electronic money.

One minor oddity in the plan is the decision to use staff rather than the general public for the initial transactions. This choice may limit early insights into user‑experience issues, but it also reduces risk while the system is still in beta.

The pilot will run for twelve months.

When the pilot concludes, the ECB expects to have a clearer picture of the operational challenges and security considerations involved. The findings will inform any legislative changes required before a full rollout could be considered.