From street traders to market women, Africa’s informal workforce is getting connected and fintech is quietly transforming the way they earn, save, and grow.
In many parts of Africa, the concept of a traditional bank account remains distant. For millions, banking halls, lengthy forms, and rigid identification requirements don’t fit into their daily rhythm. But something is shifting. Across busy markets, boda boda parks, salons, and roadside kiosks, a silent revolution is underway. The hustle is being digitised.
Fintech is meeting the informal economy where it lives on the streets, in the markets, and on mobile phones.
The Informal Economy: Too Large to Ignore
The informal sector represents a significant share of Africa’s economic activity. In countries like Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, and Uganda, the informal economy accounts for over 80 per cent of employment and up to 55 per cent of GDP. These are not marginal figures, they reflect the core engine of labour, trade, and productivity across the continent.
Yet despite their economic significance, informal workers often operate without access to formal financial services. They rely on cash transactions, handwritten records, and community-based savings methods such as rotating savings and credit associations (ROSCAs).
This exclusion isn’t due to a lack of entrepreneurial drive. It’s structural. Traditional financial systems were never designed for the fluid, cash-based, asset-light model that defines informal business in Africa. But fintech is changing that.
Fintech at Street Level
Across the continent, a new generation of fintech startups is reimagining financial inclusion for the unbanked. These innovators are not targeting salary earners in glass towers. They are designing products that suit the daily cadence of informal work — flexible, mobile, data-driven, and accessible.
In Kenya, M-PESA laid the foundation by transforming mobile phones into financial tools, enabling users to send money, pay bills, and buy goods without needing a bank account. Its success created a playbook now being adapted across the region.
In Nigeria, platforms like Moniepoint, OPay, and Paga have created agent networks that serve as physical banking touchpoints for millions. By using agent networks, mobile USSD codes, and simple apps, they are enabling small traders to send and receive money, track sales, pay bills, and even access microloans.
According to the GSMA’s Mobile Money Report, sub-Saharan Africa accounts for over 70% of the world’s mobile money transactions. What began with person-to-person transfers has now evolved into an ecosystem that supports savings, insurance, merchant payments, and digital credit.
That philosophy is evident in how these platforms are rolling out. OPay, for instance, has become a staple for riders, street vendors and food businesses by embedding payments into their daily workflows. Paga’s agent-led model has brought digital services to corners of the country where banks have never reached. Safaricom’s M-PESA has transformed Kenya’s financial DNA so much that it’s now used to pay salaries, taxes, and even school fees.
Ghana’s Zeepay has extended mobile money infrastructure to rural and cross-border markets, allowing informal workers to receive remittances and make payments without needing a smartphone. South Africa’s Yoco is providing small POS terminals for informal merchants, helping them accept card payments and gain visibility into their earnings.
These companies are not just solving problems, they’re creating new economic pathways.
Credit Without Collateral
Access to credit is one of the most transformative aspects of fintech innovation. For decades, informal businesses have faced steep barriers to financing. Without payslips, fixed addresses, or land titles, they’ve been deemed “unbankable” by traditional lenders.
Fintech is flipping that narrative.
Using alternative data such as transaction histories, airtime usage, GPS patterns, and mobile wallet behaviour, companies can now create credit scoring models that reflect the true economic activity of individuals previously ignored by formal institutions.
Startups like Tala, Branch, and Carbon are already offering microloans to gig workers and informal traders. Repayment cycles are short, terms are transparent, and funds are often disbursed instantly via mobile wallets.This model is not just financially inclusive. It’s practical. It acknowledges the real cash flow patterns of informal workers, people whose income can fluctuate daily and offers capital with agility.
Building a Financial Identity
One of the less talked-about benefits of digitisation is the creation of a financial identity. For many informal workers, there’s no formal record of income, savings, or business activity. That invisibility locks them out of future opportunities.
But with mobile POS systems, expense tracking apps, and digital receipts, micro-entrepreneurs are now building transactional footprints. These records can eventually be used to access larger credit lines, register a business, lease a workspace, or even qualify for housing.
In effect, fintech is not just offering services, it’s formalising legitimacy.
Women at the Centre of Informality
Across Africa, women make up the majority of informal workers, especially in markets, agriculture, domestic services, and small-scale retail. Yet they face disproportionate exclusion from financial services due to cultural norms, lack of documentation, and gender-based income disparities.
Some fintech companies are now addressing this head-on.
In East Africa, organisations like WomenSave are building digital savings tools tailored to women’s income patterns. Paycode, operating across several African countries uses biometric ID systems to enrol users who have no formal paperwork, a game-changer for rural women.
These innovations are not just about gender equity. They’re about unlocking millions of untapped users whose financial participation could uplift entire communities.
Barriers Still Exist
While the momentum is strong, several obstacles persist.
Digital literacy remains low in many parts of the continent. Even when fintech tools are accessible, not everyone understands how to use them safely. Fraud, identity theft, and scam apps have dented trust in some regions.
Connectivity and infrastructure pose another challenge. Internet coverage is still uneven, and smartphone penetration varies widely between urban and rural areas.
Then there’s the issue of regulation. Many fintech startups operate in grey zones where policies are still catching up with innovation. Governments must walk a fine line protecting consumers without stifling creativity. Sandbox environments, like those in Rwanda and Nigeria, are encouraging signs, but comprehensive frameworks are still needed.
Interoperability is also crucial. As more fintech players emerge, seamless integration between platforms and with banks will be essential to avoid fragmentation and increase impact.
What the Future Looks Like
The future of African fintech is not in building the next big app for urban elites. It’s in going deeper into markets, villages, workshops, and homes. It’s in understanding how money truly moves on the continent, and designing products that work with those rhythms, not against them.
We will see more integration with informal cooperatives, better tools for group savings, insurance offerings tailored to gig workers, and embedded finance in non-financial platforms like agriculture or transport.
As Africa’s population grows and its middle class expands, the line between formal and informal economies will continue to blur. Fintech will play a central role in that convergence.
The Real Revolution
The informal economy has always been innovative. From the shoemaker in Ibadan who takes mobile payments, to the mechanic in Kigali using WhatsApp to coordinate deliveries, the hustle has never lacked creativity.
What it lacked was infrastructure.
Fintech is providing that infrastructure quietly, steadily, and from the ground up. It is enabling people to dream bigger, operate smarter, and scale in ways that were previously impossible.
And in doing so, it is redefining what inclusion really means on the continent.
