PayPal button coming to your favorite apps

If you’re a heavy PayPal user, good news: the company last Friday at SXSW 2013 announced a software development kit for Apple’s registered iOS developers to integrate PayPal’s mobile payment solutions into their apps for iPhones, iPods and iPads. As a result, those developers who choose to implement the new PayPal SDK will be able to provide a PayPal button for frictionless payments. And if a user wishes to use her or his credit card, they will be able to scan it in-app to make the payment…

According to PayPal:

Customers never leave the developer’s app experience to pay and they have more choice in the way they want to pay – simply click a PayPal button or scan a credit card using our card.io technology.

They’re making the SDK available for iOS developers first (hear that, Eric Schmidt?), but it will be expanding to other platforms “soon.” More features in way of APIs will be added to the SDK later this year, the company said.

I love PayPal and use it extensively on a regular basis to manage my payments.

The service gives me piece of mind by integrating my credit cards so I don’t have to give that sensitive information to online merchants. Instead, I just provide my PayPal credentials to authorize a payment and PayPal takes care of the rest, using my PayPal credits, bank accounts or the connected credit cards to transfer the money to the merchant without ever exposing my financial information.

PayPal has a free iOS app, pictured here, that can be used to send and receive money on the go, manage your account, easily add money to a PayPal account by snapping up a photo of a check, find local merchants via the Local feature to make payments and more.

And merchants wishing to get paid directly can download the official PayPal Here app – the company will even send you a free card reader. The eBay-owned service operates in 190 markets and in 25 currencies around the world, managing 232 million accounts, with more than 123 million of them active.

PayPal is also an Apple partner.

Back in December 2004, Apple announced that its iTunes Music Store in the United States started accepting PayPal for purchases of music, apps, gift certificates and more.