The Complete Guide to Integrate a Payment Processor in Mobile Apps

Here’s what you can do to integration PayPal checkout in your mobile apps

“Do PayPal offer native app checkout?” is a question I have received from my readers recently. If you do a simple Google search, you will probably find PayPal’s Android/iOS SDK, which has been deprecated since 2018.

However, many guides on the internet still publish outdated guides using this SDK and so, in this article, I will share the most complete and current guide on how to integrate PayPal in your mobile apps.

This article will show the code for Android apps but the integration pattern works for iOS too.

Before we begin

If your app is receiving payments to a US or Europe-based PayPal account, you may use the latest PayPal Mobile Checkout SDK to integrate PayPal. And you may leave this article :)

However, if your PayPal account is outside these 2 regions, this will be the guide for you.

Prerequisites

• Intermediate to advanced knowledge in APIs, Android Development and Java
• Android Studio (this guide uses Arctic Fox 2020.3.1)
• Android API level 23+ (this guide uses 30)

PayPal Prerequisites

• A PayPal Sandbox Business account to test the integration
• A PayPal Sandbox Personal account to test the integration
• A PayPal Client ID and Secret from your REST App

You can check out my guide to set up these 3 prerequisites. Read up to Step 2 only.

What’s the difference between a Personal and Business PayPal account?

• Personal account: The buyer who will make a purchase
• Business account: The merchant who will receive the payment

To test the integration, you will need to use a fake buyer using the sandbox personal account to make a purchase on your app. If the integration is successful, your sandbox business account will receive the payment.