--- title: "What Is a Payment Gateway? Definition and Examples" description: "A payment gateway processes card, wallet and bank payments for a streaming service. See what it does, what it costs and how to choose one per market." url: "https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/payment-gateway" markdown_url: "https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/payment-gateway.md" category: "Pricing & billing" updated: "2026-10-05" --- # What is a payment gateway? A payment gateway is the service that securely collects a customer's payment details, sends the transaction to the banks and card networks for approval, and reports the result back to the business. A streaming service uses one to sell subscriptions, rentals and purchases on the web. ## How a payment gateway works The viewer enters payment details on a form hosted or secured by the gateway. The gateway encrypts them, requests authorization from the card network and issuing bank, and returns an approval or a decline within a few seconds. For subscriptions, the gateway stores a token in place of the card number so the service can charge future renewals without handling card data itself. ## What a streaming service needs from a gateway - Recurring payments with stored tokens and automatic retries - The local methods your markets use: cards, wallets, bank transfers, UPI, carrier billing - Charging and settling in local currencies - Strong customer authentication, such as 3-D Secure, where regulation requires it - Refunds, dispute handling and reporting that matches your finance records ## Choosing gateways by market No gateway is strongest everywhere. Approval rates are higher when a transaction is processed in the customer's own country, and each region has payment methods the others lack. Services that sell internationally often use one global gateway plus a local one in each major market. Fees are typically a percentage of the amount plus a fixed sum per transaction. The fixed part weighs heavily on small payments, which matters for low-priced plans and rentals. ## Payment gateway on RentAnOTT Regional payments and tax are included on every RentAnOTT plan, and payment integrations are set up as part of launch. Specialized billing platforms can be connected through premium integrations. [See features](https://www.rentanott.com/features). ## Related terms - [Recurring billing](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/recurring-billing) — Recurring billing is charging a customer's saved payment method automatically at a fixed interval, such as every month or year, until they cancel. It is the billing mechanism behind every streaming subscription. - [Transaction fee](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/transaction-fee) — A transaction fee is an amount deducted from each individual sale, as a percentage, a fixed sum or both. On a streaming service it can be charged by the payment provider, by an app store and, on some platforms, by the platform vendor itself. - [Merchant of record](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/merchant-of-record) — The merchant of record (MoR) is the legal entity that sells a product to the customer. Its name appears on the customer's statement, and it is responsible for processing the payment, collecting and remitting sales tax, and handling refunds and disputes. - [Multi-currency billing](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/multi-currency-billing) — Multi-currency billing is charging customers in their local currency instead of a single currency for everyone. The price is shown, charged and receipted in that currency, and the business receives the funds either in the same currency or converted to its own. - [Carrier billing](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/carrier-billing) — Carrier billing, or direct carrier billing (DCB), is a payment method that charges a purchase to the customer's mobile phone account. The amount is added to their monthly bill or deducted from their prepaid balance, so no card or bank account is needed. - [In-app purchase](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/in-app-purchase) — An in-app purchase (IAP) is a payment made inside a mobile or TV app using the app store's own billing system, such as Apple's App Store or Google Play. The store collects the money, keeps a commission and pays the rest to the app's publisher. - [Localized pricing](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/localized-pricing) — Localized pricing is setting a different price for the same streaming plan in each country, in the local currency and at a level that matches local incomes and competing services, instead of converting one global price at the exchange rate. - [Dunning](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary/dunning) — Dunning is the process of recovering a subscription payment that has failed. It combines automatic retries of the charge with messages asking the subscriber to update their payment details, over a set period before the subscription is cancelled. ## Further reading - [Localized pricing for streaming](https://www.rentanott.com/blogs/localized-pricing-streaming) - [How to start a streaming service](https://www.rentanott.com/blogs/how-to-start-a-streaming-service) - [Pricing](https://www.rentanott.com/pricing) ## Frequently asked questions ### Is a payment gateway the same as a payment processor? The gateway collects and transmits the payment details; the processor moves the money between banks. Many modern providers do both under one contract. ### Do payments in mobile apps use a payment gateway? Digital goods bought inside iOS and Android apps normally go through the app store's own billing rather than your gateway. Web sales, and apps on platforms that allow it, use the gateway. ### Can a service use more than one gateway? Yes. Routing each market to the gateway with the best approval rates and local methods there is common, and a second gateway is a fallback if one has an outage. All 163 terms: [Streaming and OTT glossary](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary). ## Book a demo Tell RentAnOTT what you are launching. The team walks through the platform and maps the path to go-live around your catalog, markets and revenue model. Book a demo: https://www.rentanott.com/contact ## More from RentAnOTT - [Home](https://www.rentanott.com/index.md) — What RentAnOTT is, what every plan includes, and how launch works - [Features](https://www.rentanott.com/features.md) — Every core feature and optional add-on - [Pricing](https://www.rentanott.com/pricing.md) — Platform tiers, apps, add-ons, usage rates and example bills in INR and USD - [Free tools](https://www.rentanott.com/tools.md) — OTT app builder and calculators for streaming revenue, bandwidth, bitrate and pricing - [Insights](https://www.rentanott.com/blogs.md) — All streaming business articles - [Glossary](https://www.rentanott.com/glossary.md) — Definitions of streaming and OTT terms - [Book a demo](https://www.rentanott.com/contact.md) — Talk to RentAnOTT about your launch Full site in one file: https://www.rentanott.com/llms-full.txt