It's a year late, but it's coming soon.
What you need to know
- The Los Angeles Metro is adding support for Apple Pay.
- Riders will be able to pay for their fare with an iPhone or Apple Watch.
- Support will be rolling out by the end of the year.
Apple Pay support has been rolling out to major transit authorities over the last few years, and it looks like it is poised to start operations in another major hub soon.
Reported by MacRumors, the Los Angeles Metro has announced that its TAP transit cards will begin supporting Apple Pay later this year. The LA Metro posted to its Twitter account saying that "your TAP card is coming to iPhone and Apple Watch this year."
Your TAP card is coming to iPhone and Apple Watch this year. pic.twitter.com/psQt1Uq3SD
— LA Metro (@metrolosangeles) July 14, 2020
Adding your TAP transit card to Apple Pay will allow customers of the Los Angeles Metro system to pay for their train or bus rides with their iPhone or Apple Watch instead of having to carry around a physical metro card. In order to pay for your ride, you will simply authenticate and hold your device near a TAP card reader. Customers can also turn on Express Transit to remove the need for authentication if they want to make things even quicker.
According to the report, The LA Metro has been revamping its TAP system and originally planned to roll out support for Apple Pay last year, but that was delayed until "sometime in 2020."
The LA Metro said last year that it was working with Apple to add mobile payment support for iPhones by the end of 2019, but the rollout didn't end up happening and work on the transition continues. In a tweet today, the LA Metro said that iPhone and Apple Watch support for TAP cards will be coming sometime in 2020.
Chicago, Portland, and New York City have already added support for Apple Pay on their transit systems, with many more across the world.