From airline tickets to Ferraris: What can you buy with crypto?

​Today, cryptocurrency can be used to pay for hotels, airline tickets, electronics, video games and even cars. However, merchants often end up receiving regular dollars, while the cryptocurrency component of the payment remains invisible to them. Can digital assets really be considered money in their own right under these circumstances?

According to a study by the National Cryptocurrency Association (NCA) and PayPal, four in 10 U.S. companies surveyed across several consumer categories already accept cryptocurrency. The share is even higher among large businesses, while crypto payments account for a significant portion of sales on average among companies that have adopted them.

Reasons for and extent of crypto payment adoption among businesses. Source: NCA.

However, the phrase "accepting digital assets" now covers very different models. In some cases, buyers transfer coins directly to merchants. In others, payments are instantly converted into traditional currency. And when crypto cards are used, stores may not even know that customers paid with digital assets.

What can you buy with digital assets?

Travel is one of the most prominent categories. For example, Travala allows customers to pay with cryptocurrency for more than 2.2 million accommodation properties, flights from hundreds of airlines, car rentals and travel activities. Supported assets include BTC, ETH, USDT, USDC, XRP, DOGE and dozens of other cryptocurrencies.

The process is straightforward for users: they select a hotel or flight, choose a payment method and pay for the booking from their crypto wallet.

View post on X Loading...

The tweet was deleted by the author.

But we saved everything 🙂.

This category closely aligns with the NCA/PayPal findings. Among surveyed companies, hospitality and travel businesses had the highest cryptocurrency acceptance rate, at approximately 81%. The figure was around 76% for digital goods, video games and luxury products, and about 69% for retail and e-commerce.

Everyday purchases are also gradually moving toward this model.

Services such as BitPay allow consumers to use cryptocurrency to pay for food, electronics, clothing, household goods, games, tickets and other services. According to the company, food, restaurants and beverages were the largest category of gift card purchases made with digital assets in 2025, accounting for nearly 40% of the total.

However, it is important to distinguish between merchants and intermediaries. If someone uses BTC to purchase a retailer's gift card, that does not necessarily mean the retailer itself accepts Bitcoin. For the customer, the outcome is almost identical: they have spent cryptocurrency on a product. But the merchant receives a conventional payment through an existing system.

At the other end of the market are high-value purchases. Ferrari, for example, has expanded cryptocurrency payments through its dealerships in the U.S. and Europe. Customers can purchase a vehicle using digital assets, but dealers do not necessarily have to hold BTC or ETH because the payment provider converts the funds into traditional currency.

What happens behind the checkout?

For buyers, a crypto payment looks simple: choose a cryptocurrency, confirm the transfer and receive the product. But merchants increasingly do not interact with digital assets directly.

Shopify, for example, allows merchants to accept USDC through Shopify Payments. Customers pay with the stablecoin, while stores can receive either USDC itself or traditional currency. In the latter case, conversion happens automatically, making the transaction little different from a card payment for the business.

View post on X Loading...

The tweet was deleted by the author.

But we saved everything 🙂.

PayPal uses a similar model. Its Pay with Crypto feature allows U.S. merchants to accept dozens of digital assets, while the service handles payment processing and conversion. As a result, customers spend BTC, ETH, XRP, USDT or another cryptocurrency, while businesses receive familiar money.

Crypto cards take this model even further. Users can hold funds in digital assets and pay anywhere Visa is accepted. Cafes and stores see an ordinary card transaction and may have no idea that the funds were held in cryptocurrency just seconds earlier.

As a result, the meaning of "paying with cryptocurrency" has become much broader than it was a few years ago. For customers, what matters is where the funds come from. For merchants, what matters is receiving payment in a convenient form.

View post on X Loading...

The tweet was deleted by the author.

But we saved everything 🙂.

This model is gradually removing one of the main barriers for businesses.

Stores no longer necessarily need to understand crypto wallets, hold volatile assets or overhaul their accounting systems. They simply gain another payment option without changing how they normally handle money.

Stablecoins emerge as favorites

Against this backdrop, the role of stablecoins is changing particularly rapidly. For everyday payments, USDT and USDC are more convenient than Bitcoin or Ethereum for a simple reason: their value is not supposed to fluctuate by 5–10% between making a purchase and settling the bill.

According to Allium, stablecoin payment volume reached approximately $482 billion in the first nine months of 2026, increasing by about 45% since the beginning of the year. However, most of this money does not flow through retail checkouts.

The largest categories include business-to-business settlements, services, payroll and supplier payments. Consumer purchases account for a much smaller share, at approximately $19 billion.

In other words, the main stablecoin payments story today is not about coffee or clothing. It is about moving money quickly and cheaply between countries and businesses.

Card networks are not standing on the sidelines. Visa already supports more than 160 stablecoin-linked card programs, while transaction volume across them has nearly tripled over the past year. Rather than competing directly with traditional payment systems, digital assets are increasingly being integrated into existing infrastructure.

View post on X Loading...

The tweet was deleted by the author.

But we saved everything 🙂.

Cryptocurrency can already be used to pay for nearly every familiar spending category, from travel and food to electronics and cars. But widespread adoption is not happening because merchants are abandoning dollars, euros and bank cards. Instead, it is developing through the integration of digital assets with established payment infrastructure.

This means crypto assets are effectively becoming money for users, even when merchants never see them. For customers, the distinction increasingly comes down to where the funds are deducted from, while for merchants, it is about which currency they receive.

That is why these payments increasingly look just like ordinary everyday purchases.