Account Aggregator

Before the framework, sharing a financial history commonly meant physical signed or scanned bank statements, notarised documents, or handing a username and password to a third party. The Reserve Bank issued the Non-Banking Financial Company – Account Aggregator (Reserve Bank) Directions on 2 September 2016, creating a new kind of NBFC for consent-based data sharing. Institutions could join as Financial Information Providers, such as banks, NBFCs, depositories, insurers and the GSTN, or as Financial Information Users regulated by a financial sector regulator. The network was launched on 2 September 2021, when eight banks had joined and four were already sharing data on consent.

On 12 December 2022 the Minister of State for Finance told the Lok Sabha that RBI had registered six Account Aggregators, and that 94 institutions had joined as Financial Information Users and 26 as Providers. During India's G20 Presidency in 2023, the framework was recognised as foundational digital public infrastructure, the data exchange layer alongside Aadhaar for identity and UPI for payments. By 31 December 2025, over 2.6 billion accounts were enabled to share data and 252.9 million users had linked their accounts.

A person registers voluntarily with an Account Aggregator, chooses which accounts to link, and approves each request to share data for a specific purpose with a lender, wealth manager or other regulated institution. A consent request can be rejected at any time, and a recurring consent, such as one given for the period of a loan, can be revoked later. The AA only moves the data from one institution to another and cannot see it. Under RBI's Master Direction, last updated on 6 September 2024, Account Aggregators always remain in the Base Layer of NBFC regulation, and seventeen companies held registration as of May 2026.

Official adoption figures come from different releases and do not all measure the same thing. A Ministry of Finance release of 2 September 2025 reported 2.2 billion accounts enabled and 112.34 million users with linked accounts, citing DFS data labelled October 2024. As on 31 March 2026, the DFS website, citing sahamati.org.in, lists 179 institutions live as Financial Information Providers, 989 as Users, over 2.88 billion accounts enabled and 284.6 million accounts linked by users; Financial Information Users were 94 in December 2022. The Ministry of Finance expects the ecosystem to widen formal credit access, especially for MSMEs and personal lending.

252.9 million users with linked accounts and 2.6 billion+ accounts enabled (31 Dec 2025). 179 providers and 989 users live, 2.88 billion+ accounts enabled and 284.6 million accounts linked (31 Mar 2026, DFS citing Sahamati). 17 registered Account Aggregators (May 2026), from 6 in December 2022. 94 → 989 Financial Information Users (Dec 2022 → Mar 2026). 2 Sep 2016 RBI Master Direction; 2 Sep 2021 launch. Sources: RBI; Department of Financial Services; Ministry of Finance via PIB.