Buying crypto with TWINT

If you have recently moved to Switzerland, TWINT was probably one of the first Swiss apps you installed. Train tickets, coffee, splitting the bill after dinner – it all runs through TWINT. So it is a fair question why you can't use it to buy bitcoin. The short answer: you more or less can't. No crypto exchange, crypto app or bank we checked accepts TWINT as a payment method for crypto purchases.

Two workarounds do function: buying from individuals on a P2PPeer-to-peer: individuals trade directly with each other. The platform only matches them; the money goes straight from buyer to seller. marketplace, and bitcoin vouchers that a few online resellers sell for TWINT. Both have catches. This page explains how they work, what they cost and why a plain bank transfer in francs is almost always the better route.

Who accepts TWINT for crypto – and who doesn't

For this page we went through the payment pages, price lists and help centres of 16 providers that serve customers living in Switzerland. TWINT does not appear as a deposit or payment method for crypto at any of them:

• International exchanges and apps: Kraken, SwissBorg, Bitpanda, Coinbase, Crypto.com, CEX.IO, Binance (spot trading), YouHodler
• Swiss bitcoin and crypto apps: Relai, Pocket Bitcoin, DFX.swiss, Mt Pelerin with Bridge Wallet
• Banks and neobanks: PostFinance, Swissquote, Yuh, Revolut

At PostFinance and Yuh, TWINT is linked to the same account you use to buy crypto there. The purchase itself, however, is paid from the account balance, not via TWINT. Revolut doesn't offer TWINT in Switzerland at all; according to press reports around its Swiss banking-licence application in September 2026, it is “under review”. And Bitpanda takes PostFinance Pay for francs, not TWINT.

Websites that promise “crypto with TWINT” almost always turn out to mean a P2P marketplace, a voucher reseller – or a generic list of popular payment methods that never names a single provider actually accepting TWINT.

Why crypto providers don't offer TWINT

TWINT has not published a reason, and we found no merchant rule that explicitly excludes crypto. The reasons follow from how payments work, though.

Bitcoin is final; payments aren't always. A bitcoin transaction cannot be reversed. Retail payment methods – cards and payment apps alike – come with rules for disputes, refunds and fraud investigations. If a payment comes from a hacked account and is clawed back later, the coins are long gone. Crypto providers charge for that risk: SwissBorg charges Swiss residents 4.5% for card deposits, and Mt Pelerin 2.5% to 3.8% depending on the amount.

Anti-money-laundering rules. Any business exchanging francs for crypto in Switzerland falls under the Anti-Money Laundering Act. From CHF 1,000 within 30 days, the provider must identify you and be able to trace where the money comes from. A KYCKnow Your Customer: identity check with an ID document and usually a selfie or video before you can trade.-verified transfer from an account in your own name provides that evidence automatically. Kraken, for example, only accepts bank deposits from accounts in the customer's own name.

Cost. Merchants pay a fee on TWINT payments. In crypto, where providers compete over tenths of a percent, a bank transfer is simply cheaper for both sides.

Option 1: Peach Bitcoin – bitcoin from individuals, paid via TWINT

Peach Bitcoin is a marketplace where individuals trade bitcoin with each other. It is run by Peach Sàrl, based in Neuchâtel and affiliated with the self-regulatory organisation PolyReg. Its list of franc payment methods includes bank transfer, Revolut, Wise – and TWINT.

The key point: you don't pay Peach, you pay the person selling you the bitcoin. Peach matches buyers and sellers, locks the seller's bitcoin in escrowA holding mechanism: the seller's coins are locked and only released once the buyer has paid. and mediates disputes. The bitcoin lands in the wallet inside the Peach app, which you hold yourself – Peach has no access to it.

1. 1

   Set up the app

   Install Peach Bitcoin, create the wallet and write the recovery words down on paper. Then add TWINT as a payment method.

2. 2

   Pick an offer

   Create a buy offer or accept a sell offer. Watch the price: each seller sets their own premium over the market rate.

3. 3

   Wait for escrow

   Only pay once the seller's bitcoin is locked in escrow – never before.

4. 4

   Pay via TWINT

   Send the exact amount to the TWINT number shown and confirm the payment in the app.

5. 5

   Receive the bitcoin

   Once the seller confirms receipt, the bitcoin is released to your wallet. Releases are batched by default; an immediate release costs extra.

Costs: Peach keeps 2% of the amount released from escrow, plus the network fee. The bigger item can be the price itself: sellers on P2P marketplaces often ask more than the exchange rate. Peach doesn't publish an average; you only see the premium in the offer.

Limits: without registration, Peach's terms allow CHF 1,000 a day, CHF 1,000 a month for peer-to-peer payment methods and CHF 100,000 a year. So beyond a few hundred francs a month, this route won't take you far.

P2P trading carries two more risks. A TWINT payment to a private person can't be undone at the press of a button – if you paid the wrong number or paid too early, only Peach's dispute process can help. Sellers, in turn, worry about money from third-party or hacked accounts that gets reclaimed later, so they are cautious with new buyers. And if you regularly send TWINT payments to strangers, expect your bank to ask questions at some point.

Binance P2P also has a page for bitcoin against TWINT in francs. When we checked, there was not a single offer. Binance has no FINMA authorisation in Switzerland, we found no membership of a Swiss self-regulatory organisation, and no Binance entity appears in the EU register of MiCA providers. More in our Binance review.

Option 2: bitcoin vouchers paid with TWINT

The second workaround uses gift-card style vouchers. The best-known brand in Switzerland is Cryptonow, distributed by Värdex Suisse AG in Baar. Physical cards have been sold at kiosks and – according to finews, from December 2023 – in 160 Coop branches, for CHF 50 to 500, paid at the till. We could not check where they are still available today. Online, voucher resellers sell the same cards: TWINT is mentioned in the product description for the k kiosk online shop, Startselect lists TWINT among its general payment methods, and dundle does not offer it. We did not make a purchase ourselves; the k kiosk page would not open during our check because of an expired security certificate.

After buying, you activate the voucher online with the wallet ID, the scratch-off PIN and a code sent by text message. The bitcoin then sits in a kind of paper wallet that you move to your own wallet. Selling back through Cryptonow isn't possible.

We could not confirm the cost: Cryptonow's website is geo-blocked outside Switzerland. A 2021 test by finanzdepot.ch reported a CHF 1 activation fee plus 6.9% commission; one reseller says the fee is built into the rate shown. Validity is also stated inconsistently – 12 months at one reseller, 10 years at another. That is why the calculator above shows a range of 6% to 7.5% for vouchers. Värdex states on its own website that it is not supervised by FINMA and that voucher amounts are not covered by deposit insurance. All cash routes, kiosks included, are compared in our guide to buying bitcoin with cash.

What TWINT itself is planning

In October 2025, TWINT announced that it wanted to open its platform to providers of regulated digital currencies – Swiss franc stablecoinsA cryptocurrency whose value is pegged to a national currency, for example 1 token = 1 franc. and tokenised bank deposits – and to the e-ID. At first this meant talks with authorities, regulators and market participants, not a product.

Things got more concrete in September 2026: SIX and TWINT joined a sandbox in which UBS, PostFinance, Sygnum, Raiffeisen, Zürcher Kantonalbank and Banque Cantonale Vaudoise have been testing a franc stablecoin called CHFD since April 2026. The test phase runs in a protected environment with limited users and amounts. The focus is on programmable payments, for example to make fraud on online marketplaces harder.

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are not part of this. Whether TWINT will one day let you buy crypto is an open question; nothing has been announced.

The fastest franc routes – without TWINT

If what you like about TWINT is speed and paying in francs, there are good alternatives:

• SIC transfer to an exchange: Kraken accepts francs through Bank Frick via SICSwiss Interbank Clearing: the payment system for franc transfers between Swiss and Liechtenstein banks, run by SIX on behalf of the Swiss National Bank. – from CHF 1, free of charge, credited the same day. The step-by-step is in our guide to buying crypto by bank transfer; more on the provider in our Kraken review.
• Instant payments: since August 2024, the largest Swiss banks have had to process franc payments in under ten seconds, around the clock, and the remaining banks are being connected step by step. This only helps if the crypto provider's bank takes part as well – few advertise it.
• Straight from your bank account: PostFinance sells 22 cryptocurrencies in e-finance and its app, from USD 50, for 0.95%. Full details in our guide to PostFinance crypto. Yuh starts at CHF 10 for 1% (Yuh review).
• PostFinance Pay on Bitpanda: according to payment provider wallee, PostFinance Pay has been available on Bitpanda for francs since February 2025 (Bitpanda review).
• Revolut: if you already keep francs on Revolut – common among newcomers – you can buy crypto straight from your balance. On the Standard plan this costs 1.49% or a minimum fee (Revolut review).

Which of these gets you to your first bitcoin fastest is compared in our guide to the fastest way to buy crypto. And if you'd rather pay cash: SBB ticket machines sell bitcoin for CHF 20 to 500, paid with notes, a PostFinance Card or Maestro.

Beware of “bitcoin for TWINT” in chats

In Telegram groups, on classified-ad sites and in social media comments, strangers offer “instant bitcoin for TWINT” – no platform, no escrow. The pattern is almost always the same: you pay, the coins never arrive. Sometimes your account is simply used to pass on someone else's money.

• Never pay a stranger via TWINT before the coins are locked in escrow.
• Ignore chat “helpers” who offer to set up a TWINT purchase for you.
• Never share your recovery words, or a photo of them, with anyone.
• Don't accept money from strangers into your account to forward via TWINT.

More scams and what to do if something goes wrong are covered in our guide to crypto scams in Switzerland.

Bottom line: for crypto, TWINT is a detour, not a route

For small amounts, Peach Bitcoin is the only verifiable way to pay for bitcoin with TWINT – at a 2% fee, plus the seller's premium and the risks of trading with strangers. Vouchers paid with TWINT exist, but their costs are not transparent. For everything else, a bank transfer in francs is cheaper, traceable and usually done the same day. If you want to hold your bitcoin yourself afterwards, see our comparison of crypto wallets in Switzerland.