After Refusing to Take Apple Pay, Walmart Launches Walmart Pay

This post originally appeared on Business Insider.

Walmart is rolling out its own mobile payment system, calling it Walmart Pay.

The system, like Apple Pay, allows customers to purchase items using their smartphones. Walmart Pay works through the retailer's mobile app. Customers can pay for their items by opening the app, activating their phone cameras, and scanning a QR code at checkout. After the code has been scanned, the purchase has been made and the checkout is complete.

"We're really working hard to create a seamless shopping experience at Walmart," Neil Ashe, president and CEO of Walmart global e-commerce, told reporters on Wednesday.

Walmart Pay connects to numerous payment options, including credit cards, debit cards, prepaid cards, and gift cards. Customers can register their payment options through the app or on Walmart.com.

Walmart is rolling out the new payment system after refusing to partner with Apple Pay. The retailer said it built Walmart Pay—instead of offering other options like Apple Pay—because it wanted customers to have the freedom to use any brand of phone to make their purchases.

The technology will be rolled out at stores near Bentonville, Arkansas, where Walmart's headquarters are located, on Thursday.

The retailer will expand it to test markets across the country after the holidays, and it will be rolled out nationwide within the first half of next year, executives said.

Roughly 22 million customers use Walmart's app every month. The retailer said nearly half of customers' orders from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday were placed on a mobile device.

See also: Here's How to Turn Your iPhone Into a Working Scale