You can create payment links in three ways:
Customer Area — no development work required (covered in depth below).
Pay by Link iOS app — manage links from your mobile device.
Pay by Link API — the most flexible option; supports additional use cases. See the Pay by Link: Overview article for an API example.
How it works (at a glance)
When a shopper places an order, create a payment link with the amount, currency, and country/region.
Send the link to the shopper over email, chat, or SMS.
The shopper opens the link and sees the payment page with the payment methods available in their country/region.
After the shopper completes the payment, you get the result via webhook or email.
Link expiry and reusability
Payment links expire after 24 hours by default. You can extend expiry up to 70 days.
After five unsuccessful payment attempts, a link expires early.
By default a link is single-use — after a successful payment, anyone opening it sees "You have already paid".
For use cases like donations, you can override the default so multiple shoppers can pay on the same link.
Risk, capture, and 3D Secure
Pay by Link payments are standard ecommerce payments, so your risk and capture settings apply. If you manually capture payments, you'll also need to capture Pay by Link payments manually. 3D Secure 1 and 2 are supported out of the box, so you still get liability shift when applicable.
Create a payment link in the Customer Area
Before you begin
Make sure you've followed the Get started with Adyen guide so that you have a test account. Then:
Add your Terms and Conditions to the Pay by Link payment page (see the Terms & Conditions for Pay by Link article).
Confirm you have the required API and Customer Area user permissions (see below).
Add payment methods to your account.
Configure your Pay by Link creation settings to control what information users collect when making a link.
Check your API permissions
Log in to your Customer Area.
Go to Developers > API credentials.
Select
ws@Company.[YourCompanyAccount]and confirm it has the Pay by Link permissions.
Check your Customer Area user permissions
Log in to your Customer Area.
Go to Settings > Users.
Select the user who will create links.
Under Roles and Associated Accounts, confirm they have the Pay by Link Interface role.
If the role is missing, email [email protected].
Step 1 — Create the link
Log in to your Customer Area and switch to your merchant account.
Go to Pay by Link > Payment links.
Select Create payment link. The fields shown depend on your creation settings.
Fill in the transaction details.
If you have the email service enabled, tick the options under Payment link email to send the request directly to the shopper's email, and/or send a confirmation email on successful payment. Then enter the shopper's email address.
Fill in any fields under Additional details.
Select Create payment link.
Step 2 — Send the link
On the confirmation page, select Copy link and share it with your shopper. Example:
https://test.adyen.link/PL45D0F79183A4CCA2
When the shopper selects the link, they're redirected to the Adyen-hosted payment form, where they can pay with any method available in the shopper country/region you configured.
Step 3 — Get updates on the payment
After the shopper pays, check the result in the Customer Area under Transactions > Payments.
You can also:
Email updates — configure email recipients in your Pay by Link general settings. You'll get the merchant reference, PSP reference, and payment method.
Webhooks — send payment updates to your server. Requires development work.
Payment link details are kept for three months. After that they're no longer available.
View payment links
In the Customer Area, go to Pay by Link > Payment Links to see links created in the last 90 days.
Links can have the following statuses:
Active — the link is usable.
Completed — the payment has been authorized. If you use manual capture, you still need to capture it.
Payment pending — the final result isn't known yet.
Expired — the link has expired.
Reusable links only ever show Active or Expired — they never move to Completed.
Tokenize payment details
Always ask for the shopper's consent before tokenizing their payment details.
When you create payment links through the Customer Area, tokenization only supports recurring payments — not one-off payments. For one-off tokenization, use the Pay by Link API.
To tokenize for recurring payments:
Enable tokenization in your Pay by Link settings.
When creating the link, include the Shopper reference.
Force expiry of a payment link
If you need to invalidate a link — for example, because the shopper's order changed — you can expire it manually:
Go to Pay by Link > Payment Links.
Under the Payment link column, select the link.
In the Summary section, select Manually expire link.
Customize the payment page
Payment methods
Payment methods are ordered by popularity in the shopper's country/region. You can change the order or hide methods per country.
You need the Change payment methods user role.
Log in to your Customer Area.
Go to Settings > Checkout settings.
Select a Shopper country/region.
Drag methods into the order you want, or drag them to Other configured payment methods to hide them.
Themes
Themes let you set a background image and brand logo for the payment page. If you create multiple themes on a merchant account, you can pick one when creating a link.
You need the Merchant admin or Pay by Link Settings role.
In the Customer Area, switch to your merchant account.
Go to Pay by Link > Themes.
Select Create a new theme.
Enter a Theme name (visible internally) and Display name (visible to the shopper).
Upload a brand logo and a background image.
Enter a background color (used as a fallback if the image can't load).
If this should be the default, tick Set as default.
Select Create.
At the company-account level you can only create one theme; merchant accounts support multiple themes and a default. If a merchant account has no themes, the company-account theme is used.
Test and go live
Before going live, use Adyen's list of test cards and payment methods to test every method you plan to offer. Check your test payments in the Customer Area under Transactions > Payments.
Related articles
Pay by Link: Overview
Terms & Conditions for Pay by Link
Can you surcharge on Pay by Link?