When traveling to China, which is also a very mobile-first country, you're expected to install AliPay and WeChat. A couple of years ago AliPay started accepting foreign bank cards, which you add to your account (in addition to lots of other information including photos of yourself and scans of your government id), and then pay through the AliPay application everywhere. Cash has been made extremely inconvenient or even impossible to use, foreign cards are also often not accepted.

The government and one of the largest banks collaborated to release an app which lets tourists make payments through the QR based system this year: https://www.tatnews.org/2025/03/tourist-e-wallet-tagthai-eas...

> I am curious: how do tourists pay?

Cash or normal credit/debit card, but I guess that for native having a credit/debit card costs more money and cash well, it's cash like everywhere else with its pros and cons.