Introducing ETHPay
Open sourced Apple pay equivalent for ETH payments on mobile
For developers, by developers.
As seen on GitHub Ethereum EIPs
The Web3 dependency
DApps as of today rely fundamentally on Web3 and Ethereum Wallets.
MetaMask
Pro : MetaMask has been the first viable solution to enable large scale DApp development by injecting the Web3 environment into the browser’s session. However, till date, MetaMask is available only for Firefox and Chrome on laptops/desktops. It also acts as an ETH wallet.
Con: The extension doesn’t work for mobile browsers because of OS limitation.
Token/Toshi/Coinbase Wallet
Pro : Browsers like Coinbase wallet have an inbuilt browser with Web3 injected already, without the requirement of an extension like MetaMask. They also allow users to manage their ETH accounts.
Con : Lacking in a lot of browser functionality like push notifications and full support for service workers and PWAs. DApp developers cannot build seamless experiences optimized for mobile.
The most important use of Web3
Web3 can be used for a variety of purposes. However the top usecase for most developers remains signing and sending transactions (aka making payments).
Why we haven’t seen any killer DApps
If a developer wants to make a native app that in some way requires the users to make ETH payments or sign some data, they would as of today need to build a wallet inside their own iOS and Android Apps. This is a major overhead for developers, especially when compared to the seamless integration available with fiat payment systems like Stripe, PayPal and Apple Pay.
The most important missing piece
EthPay is an open sourced app that is a simple Ethereum Wallet that can be used to sign transactions from any app or website.
With a single line of code, a developer can request the user of her app to make a payment without having to develop an Ethereum wallet inside her app.
As long as the user has an EthPay installed or any other wallet that adheres to the ethpay protocol, the user will be able to sign transactions without having to create a new account or trusting the app developer with their private keys.
ETHPay is an Ethereum Wallet as a service
Development
Open Sourced
The basic ETHPay app runs on both Android and iOS. It is built using React Native and Web3.js 1.0
Future
ERC20 token support is coming soon!
