Wallet push notifications for loyalty cards: how they work on iPhone and Android (2026)

When people hear that a digital stamp card, or loyalty card as we call it, can send notifications, they picture a marketing app pushing offers. It is not that. A loyalty card in Apple Wallet and Google Wallet is a pass, and a pass can be updated by the business that issued it. The notification is the phone’s way of telling the customer that the pass changed: a new stamp, a reward unlocked, a message from the café. That difference explains most of what notifications can and cannot do, so this guide starts there. Stampioo publishes this page and sells a loyalty card that uses exactly these mechanisms, from €29 a month with the notifications included; the platform facts come from Apple’s and Google’s own documentation, linked at the bottom.

What actually happens on an iPhone

A pass in Apple Wallet is a small file on the phone. When the customer adds it, the phone registers with the issuer’s server for updates. When something on the card changes, say a stamp is added, the issuer sends a silent push to the phone, the phone fetches the new version of the pass, and the pass updates in Wallet. Whether the customer sees anything depends on the pass: each field on a pass can carry a change message, and when a field with a change message changes, iOS shows a banner on the lock screen with that message and the new value. Fields without a change message update silently. Apple documents this in its Wallet pass developer guides, linked below.

Two consequences follow. The notification is always tied to a real change on the card, which is why it feels relevant rather than spammy: the customer just bought a coffee and the card says eight of ten. And the text is short, because it describes a changed field, not a campaign. Tapping the banner opens the pass, and that is where any longer message, offer or discount code lives. This is exactly what a Stampioo card does when staff scan it: the stamp count on the card changes, and the customer sees the new count on the lock screen within seconds, with no app involved.

Separately from updates, a pass can carry up to ten locations. When the phone is near one of them (roughly 100 metres on iPhone), Wallet can show the pass on the lock screen as a quiet suggestion with the text the issuer chose. Nothing is sent at that moment; the phone decides on its own, and it makes no sound.

What actually happens on Android

A loyalty card in Google Wallet is an object on Google’s servers that the Wallet app displays. The issuer updates the object through Google’s API, and the card on the phone changes. For a notification, the issuer adds a message to the pass with the notify option, and Google Wallet sends the push and draws the notification; the issuer does not control its layout. Google’s developer documentation sets the limit plainly: at most 3 messages that trigger a push notification per pass in a 24-hour period, and Google may throttle an issuer it considers to be spamming its users. Customers must have notifications enabled for their passes to receive them.

Location works too, within about 150 metres of a saved address, but on Android the text of a nearby notification is Google’s standard wording, not the merchant’s, and it can make a sound depending on the customer’s settings. Google Wallet needs Android 9 or later and a Google account on the phone, so an older or account-free Android phone cannot hold the card at all. A Stampioo card in Google Wallet gets the same stamp and reward updates as on iPhone, and a campaign reaches it as a message on the pass, so you write one text and both platforms show it.

iPhone and Android side by side

What a merchant can send

Automatic updates

With Stampioo, three things notify on their own: a new stamp, a reward getting close and a reward unlocked. Staff scan the card with the phone scanner, the card in the customer’s Wallet updates on the spot, and the customer sees the change on the lock screen. This happens on every plan and costs nothing per message. It is also the notification customers like best, because they caused it a second ago.

Campaigns

A campaign is a message you write, sent to all cardholders or to a group: customers who have not been in for a while, customers with a reward waiting, customers with a birthday coming up, new customers. You write a short text, ideally with a discount code in the text itself, pick the audience, schedule it or send it now, and see how many cards it reached. Targeted campaigns are included in Pro, 10 a month, with no cost per message. Keep the text short: the lock screen shows a line or two, and the full text is on the card.

Nearby reminders

You add your address in the dashboard, switch on the nearby reminder and write the lock screen text for iPhone. When a customer who holds your card walks past, the card can appear on the lock screen. Up to ten addresses per card, on every plan, and Stampioo never sees the customer’s position: the phone does the matching.

What a Wallet notification cannot do

• No images, no buttons, no links inside the notification. It is text and the pass icon. The customer taps it and sees the card, and the card is where you put the offer.
• No scheduling by the minute on Android beyond the 3-per-day cap, and no guarantee of timing on either platform: pushes are delivered when the phone is online and Apple or Google decide to deliver.
• No reach beyond cardholders. A notification goes to the phones that hold the card and have notifications on. It is a channel to your existing customers, not an advertising channel.
• No reading receipts. You see how many cards a campaign reached, not who read it.
• No guaranteed attention. Customers mute Wallet notifications like any others, and a merchant who sends three messages a day teaches them to.

On the last point, measure campaigns by what happens next rather than by a vendor’s open rate: visits, stamps and rewards redeemed in the days after a send, which the analytics show per period. Vendors quote open rates between about 35 and 69 percent for Wallet notifications, and a 98 percent figure that circulates is SMS data. None of it is independently measured, and we do not publish a number of our own for the same reason.

Wallet notifications compared with SMS

An SMS costs money per message, needs the customer’s phone number and marketing consent, and lands in a text thread next to delivery codes. It can carry a link, and it reaches people who never saved a card. A Wallet notification is free per message, needs only that the customer saved the card and left notifications on, and opens the card with the stamps and the offer on it. For the customers you already have, the Wallet notification is the cheaper and more relevant channel; for reaching people who are not yet customers, neither is the right tool.

If you want to see how the card itself works before the notifications, read our guide to stamp cards in Apple Wallet and Google Wallet. Plans start at €29 a month excluding VAT, with automatic notifications on every plan and campaigns in Pro at €49; the pricing page lists what each plan includes.