I see a mix of card tapping and phone tapping here. I myself only use my card when my phone is out of battery or when the amount to pay is larger than the bank allows by default (though I'm pretty sure you can raise that).
It was pretty weird seeing Apple users around me get excited about finally being able to pay with their phones when the first bank here started offering Apple Pay. I guess they never noticed that every other brand of smartphone had been doing that for give years at that point?
As for the public transit system, the stupid mess of checking in and out at varioustterminals still exists, but they are indeed working on using bank cards for public transit. They're of limited use though (no ability to store discounts and such) and not all transit companies accept them yet. I'm not sure what the situation is with credit cards, as the Netherlands is very much debit card oriented. The cards follow the same standards, but as any American trying to do groceries here will find out, that doesn't mean all cards will work on all terminals.
I was told that and then I basically used nothing but my contactless credit card over the course of a week. But I was admittedly mostly in central Amsterdam and doing tourist stuff and restaurants.
This has changed quite substantially over the last five+ years. It certainly used to be the case that using certain cards that were very common in the rest of Europe (particularly credit cards, but also things like visa debit) required jumping through hoops in the Netherlands, and often weren't accepted.
A Dutch friend, who knows the industry a little, said that the Dutch banks had gone their own way with payment systems in the past. This heritage had taken some time to unwind. (I guess he was talking about things like Chipknip?)
Another Amsterdam local advised just getting a pay as you go chip card for public transit. He said that they were in the process of implementing just accepting contactless credit/debit cards directly but it was a bit hit or miss whether that was accepted in general.
For example, the largest supermarket chain (Albert Heijn) usually won't take credit cards, with the exception of certain cities and contexts (train stations) where there are more foreigners.
Canada is the same I can't recall the last time I used cash or coins, perhaps two decades? It's tap debit or now more frequently my phone using Google Wallet.
American credit cards work just fine with OV Pay for both NS and regional public transport (tried it with a Chase Visa card). Side note: Albert Heijn also finally started accepting them, so credit cards are now accepted at almsot all merchants.
When did AH start accepting anything besides NL debit? I have a US debit card that didn't work as recently as Nov 2022. It was a major pain in the ass taking cash out of the ATM right next to the checkout just to buy groceries for a month while I waited on approval for a Dutch bank account.
Silly me at the time didn't realize I could go next door to Jumbo and pay with whatever the hell I wanted... live and learn!
My limited anecdotal evidence from going to an AH in Amsterdam as a tourist just last week, the card terminal still had a sticker on it saying "No Visa/Mastercard". That said, did a quick Google and this Reddit post[0] (in Dutch) implies that perhaps even the terminals with that sticker accept debit/credit cards as of 4 months ago.
I believe it was around the beginning of 2023. Maestro has been deprecated and no further cards will be issued from July this year, so all merchants need to start accepting other card types (Mastercard/Visa Debit) by then at the latest.
Hopefully this will put an end to the common perception in NL that Mastercard/Visa == credit card. Most of them aren't!
It was pretty weird seeing Apple users around me get excited about finally being able to pay with their phones when the first bank here started offering Apple Pay. I guess they never noticed that every other brand of smartphone had been doing that for give years at that point?
As for the public transit system, the stupid mess of checking in and out at varioustterminals still exists, but they are indeed working on using bank cards for public transit. They're of limited use though (no ability to store discounts and such) and not all transit companies accept them yet. I'm not sure what the situation is with credit cards, as the Netherlands is very much debit card oriented. The cards follow the same standards, but as any American trying to do groceries here will find out, that doesn't mean all cards will work on all terminals.