Over the last decade, restaurants invested heavily in mobile apps — and for a while, that was enough. The app served as the digital front door, the loyalty hub, and the place where brands could capture deeper engagement.
But consumer behavior is shifting. Today’s guests, especially Gen Z, aren’t building their digital lives around apps anymore. They’re building them around a single, universal interface they use dozens of times a day:
The mobile wallet.
Apple Wallet and Google Wallet have quietly become the new homepage of everyday digital behavior. It’s where payments live, where identity is stored, where boarding passes update in real time, and where brand interactions now feel the most natural.
And increasingly? It’s where restaurant loyalty is beginning.
Apps aren’t dead, but the starting point has changed
Restaurant loyalty isn’t struggling because guests don’t care. The interest is there. The intent is there. The spend is absolutely there. What’s missing is access.
Most guests simply aren’t ready to download an app at the very first interaction with a brand. Data shows that only 25–30% of guests who begin downloading a restaurant app ever complete registration — and over 70% drop off when faced with a mandatory login.
Guests aren’t rejecting loyalty. They’re rejecting friction.
This is especially true for Gen Z — a generation we explore deeply in our Gen Z Loyalty Whitepaper. They expect immediacy, mobile-native flow, and near-zero onboarding effort. If engagement isn’t instant, they move on.
So where are they already engaging instantly? Inside the mobile wallet.
Why Apple and Google Wallet are becoming the new loyalty front door
The wallet has evolved into one of the most behavior-rich surfaces on the phone. It’s always accessible. It’s checked frequently. It holds identity, payments, tickets, and now increasingly loyalty.
A loyalty pass in the wallet doesn’t get lost or forgotten. It sits next to the payment card, reminding the guest that a reward is waiting or that points are accumulating. It updates on its own. It’s effortless.
For restaurants, this isn’t just a new channel. It’s a new timing model for engagement — one where loyalty begins the moment a pass is added, not the moment an app is downloaded.
The wallet doesn’t compete with the app. It precedes it. It creates the earliest, lowest-friction moment of connection in the entire digital journey.
Introducing Smart Passes: a new first step in the loyalty lifecycle
Traditional wallet passes were static, little more than digital coupons or barcodes. Smart Passes, from PAR Engagement, redefine what the wallet can do for restaurants.
Smart Passes are dynamic, real-time loyalty credentials that plug directly into Punchh’s engagement ecosystem. They update automatically as guests earn, redeem, and return. They allow restaurants to onboard guests with a single tap. They eliminate logins. They meet behavior where it already happens.
For the guest, it feels effortless. For the marketer, it expands the top of the loyalty funnel. For the brand, it shortens the path to first visit and to second.
And the best part? The wallet actually strengthens app adoption. Apple reports that 30% of users who install a wallet pass go on to download the brand’s app afterward, making Smart Passes a funnel accelerator — not a replacement.
The result is a healthier, more natural progression:
Wallet → App → Long-term loyalty.
Apps still matter — and Smart Passes make more guests ready for them
This is an important distinction. Smart Passes aren’t here to replace apps. Apps remain essential for deeper digital experiences: mobile ordering, personalization, saved payments, browsing menus, loyalty dashboards, and richer brand interactions.
What Smart Passes do is solve the biggest challenge apps have always faced:
How do you get guests engaged early enough to want the app?
By lowering the barrier to the first interaction, Smart Passes let guests see value immediately — often within seconds. Once they experience the payoff (points, perks, live updates), they’re far more likely to deepen the relationship and download the app when they’re ready.
Think of Smart Passes as the on-ramp and the app as the destination. Both matter. Both work together. Both succeed because they meet guests at different moments in their journey.
Smart Passes give restaurants the infrastructure to participate in this shift — to greet guests in the flow of their daily behavior, not behind a wall of app friction.
When the first touchpoint lives in the wallet, loyalty feels immediate, intuitive, and natural. And instead of losing guests in the download stage, brands keep them — long enough to deliver real value, long enough to drive repeat visits, and long enough to earn the app download that deepens the relationship even further.
The wallet is becoming the new homepage — not because it does everything, but because it does the first thing better than anything else: it meets guests in their real habits. That’s where modern loyalty begins.
Want to see how frictionless the new first touchpoint can be?
Try Smart Passes for yourself — join loyalty in one tap and experience live updates in your mobile wallet. No login. No download. No delay.
Learn more about Smart Passes or schedule a personalized demo.
