Most of us are familiar with Square as the company that makes those white credit card swiping machines used by many cafes and small merchants. The corporation recently rebranded to Block, Inc., but its many Square functions and digital services have only grown and improved over time. Cash App—the company’s free mobile payment tool—lets you pay and request money from friends, make contactless payments with Square readers, or online purchases with the Cash App debit card. Competition in the mobile payment app market is fierce, with Cash App contending with the likes of Apple Pay, Google Pay, Venmo, PayPal, and even Zelle. Still, Cash App holds its own thanks to several unique features, including tax-filing and stock and Bitcoin purchasing.
Getting Started With Cash App
To open a Cash App account, you can enter either your mobile number or email—you don’t need a mobile number. Next, you must enter a debit card number, and then choose a name for your $Cashtag (more on this later). Finally, and optionally, you can invite friends to sign up, netting you a $5 reward for each one who does. You can also connect a credit card as a payment source, but, as with other mobile payment services, you pay a 3 percent fee when paying that way. Note that Cash App only works in the US and UK; if you need to pay across other borders in multiple currencies, you should consider PayPal.
On the account page, a single slider let us require FaceID to transfer money—a good idea. You can also set up a cash.app/$cashtag, which lets you pay via web browser at that web address, where Cashtag is replaced by a nickname you choose. You can also scan another person’s QR code to pay them, and, of course, it works the other way; you get your own QR code for receiving payments. Be careful not to accept payments from people you don’t know, however, as this can land you in a whole heap of trouble, if, for example, the money came from a stolen credit card.
How to Use Cash App
Cash App has one of the simplest, most effective interfaces we’ve seen in any such app. It’s just a big numeric keypad with buttons at the bottom for requesting and sending money. Up top, you’ll see account details (a head-and-shoulders icon) and transaction history (a clock). When the transaction is complete, you can view a web receipt as documentation for it.
There are no frills, much like Venmo‘s thankfully defunct payment social network and PayPal’s food ordering service. When someone pays you, you can either keep the money in your account, or you can enable Auto Cash Out in Settings, which dumps the money straight to your connected ATM bank account.
Cash App lets you send up to $250 within a seven-day period, and receive up to $1,000 per 30-day period. If you verify your account, which includes adding a social security number, the limits increase. Once verified, you can send up to $7,500 per week and receive an unlimited amount. This is comparable with Venmo’s $300 initial weekly cap that climbs to $5,000 with further verification. Likewise, Google Pay lets you send $5,000 in one transaction, or up to $20,000 in seven days.
You can sign into your Cash App account in a web browser after getting an SMS code from your smartphone. The site lets you see your transaction history, make payments online, and change account settings. Google Pay, PayPal, and Zelle all let you pay or request money from people in the web browser, but Venmo no longer does. Apple Pay works similarly, but only in the Safari web browser. You can also download an Excel spreadsheet of your activity.
Once you’ve got an account, you can request a physical Cash Card, which lets you pay anywhere you could with a debit card. Applying for this requires no further proof of anything, and the card offers impressive discounts, including 10 percent off grocery store purchases and DoorDash orders. It can also be used for online purchases, and it is generally accepted anywhere that takes Visa.
Hashtag $Cashtag
Cash App’s attempts to differentiate itself is through the unfortunately named $Cashtag system. Every Cash App user is assigned a personal $Cashtag. You can send money directly to Cash App users through their $Cashtag URL alone without asking for email addresses or phone numbers. In fact, users make their $Cashtag public so anyone can send them money, such as a donation. $Cashtags are a neat idea, even if they do seem contrived, but keep in mind that income earned through Cash App—donation or otherwise—may be taxable.
The Apple Watch version of Cash App lets you perform simple tasks, such as accepting or rejecting payments, and sending “virtual stacks of cash” to friends and family nearby via Bluetooth, all from your wrist. The big icons for different cash values, like $5 or $100, make it easy to pay out common amounts.
In addition, Cash App now supports contactless payment between Cash App and the Square mobile card reader. Selecting the QR scanner on the top corner of your screen lets you scan a QR code at a Square Seller’s point of sale, making payments with Cash App a cinch.
Cash App Taxes
The service formerly known as Credit Karma Tax was acquired by Block, Inc. last year, and integrated with Cash App. As a result, Cash App provides free, online federal and state tax preparation and filing, with support for most major IRS forms and schedules.
As Cash App Taxes, it utilizes Cash App’s convenient browser and mobile interface, offering yet another handy function to the app’s already impressive suite. It has a few limitations to keep in mind, such as a lack of expert tax help, limited W2 imports, and a general lack of depth, but it’s still an option worth considering. Read our preview for our full Cash App Taxes impressions.
Cash App Investing and Bitcoin
Unlike any other payment app we’ve reviewed, Square Cash lets you purchase stocks and Bitcoin. You access these options from the squiggly chart-line icon along the bottom of the app interface. The app provides market prices and news to help you see which stocks are hot. You can follow stocks to keep track of them or just buy them with balance in your Cash account. But like much of the app, it tends to oversimplify the investing game. Its quotes don’t show you basics like a stock’s price-to-earnings ratio, analyst targets, earnings beats and misses, or yields. For detailed info like that, check out the still-leading Yahoo Finance app or site.
It also lets you buy fractional shares, a capability pioneered by Stash and hyped by Robinhood, but one that’s now offered by bigger houses like Fidelity and Schwab. Fractional share purchasing means you can get in on a piece of Berkshire Hathaway, which at the time of writing trades at an impressive $459,000 per share, without spending the monetary equivalent of a house for the whole share. If you’re serious about investing, however, look to a fuller-featured brokerage site—most even offer commission-free trading these days.
To start buying stocks or Bitcoin via Cash App, you need to verify your identity and date of birth, the last four digits of your Social Security number, mobile phone number, and employer. You can search by stock symbol or pick from a selection of sectors or hot stocks. You can set recurring purchases for dollar-cost averaging—a smart strategy that means you’re not putting all your eggs in the current basket but buying when it’s low as well as high.
As for buying Bitcoin, Cash App makes it easier than any other system we’ve seen. To invest in Bitcoin, we didn’t have to go through scanning a driver’s license and waiting days for approval as we did with Coinbase. You do need to go through this process if you want to use Square’s wallet to transact with Bitcoins—that is, to send or receive them. Also, keep in mind that, though it’s the best-known, Bitcoin is one of the more antiquated and less exciting cryptocurrencies at this point. For example, over the last month at the time of writing, Bitcoin has dropped 28 percent. If you’re really interested in getting into cryptocurrencies, we’d advise you to sign up with a broker offering a bigger range of coins.
Security and Support
Cash App states that it is certified as PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) Level 1, which is the same security used by major credit cards. Nevertheless, it’s a good idea to make sure that you enable the Security Lock using FaceID or TouchID on the iPhone or whatever biometric authentication your Android phone uses. Think twice about broadcasting your $Cashtag widely, too, since scams have been known to occur in which bad guys put money in your account and then try to reclaim it through nefarious means. For example, they’ll use a stolen credit card to pay you with.
Support with Cash App has much improved since we last reviewed it. The help page is features four panels for Cash Card, Direct Deposit, ATM, and Cash Boost discounts, each of which lead to extensive information page about the subject at hand. Lower on the help page is a list of popular search topics, including receiving a payment, cashing out, account settings, Bitcoin, and others. Below that is a short FAQ with a few more popular questions, as well as a support link to contact customer support more directly.
Cash App utilizes the same security features and fraud-detection infrastructure that Square POS transactions use to keep your account safe. However, when it comes to cancelations, refunds, and disputes, Cash App suggests that you resolve any issues directly with the merchant first before disputing a charge with support. Afterward, Cash App investigates the claim. This isn’t as good as the peace of mind offered by PayPal, which features an ironclad guarantee that you’ll either get what you purchased or get your money back.
Square Up With Cash App
Cash App not only lets you pay friends, but it makes investing and even taxes a bit easier, which is more than most alternatives can say. It does this without the clutter that other mobile payment services needlessly inject. Cash App has grown in popularity, making it much easier to pay and send money within the user base, and it has expanded in functionality to allow users to pay Square sellers, as well. If the $Cashtags, Cash Card discounts, tax-filing potential, and micro investing options appeal to you, Square Cash is a great choice. For a payment app and service that lets you pay in stores as well as offering loyalty programs and cross-platform support, check out our Editors’ Choice pick, Google Pay.
