The NMI gateway — the NMI payment gateway built by Network Merchants, Inc. — is a white-label software platform that captures card payments and routes them to a processor for settlement. It handles e-commerce, in-person EMV, and mobile transactions through one system, connects to more than 200 processors and acquirers, and tokenizes card data in the Customer Vault. Crucially, NMI is a gateway, not a processor — and it is sold almost entirely through resellers, which is why most merchants use it under another company's brand.
Gateway vs. processor — the part that confuses everyone
Processor / acquirer
Clears the transaction with Visa/Mastercard and settles money to the merchant's bank. Examples: Fiserv, Worldpay, TSYS.
Gateway (NMI)
The software that captures, encrypts, tokenizes, and screens the card, then routes it to the processor. Processor-agnostic.
Because NMI connects to 200+ processors, the same merchant-facing gateway can sit in front of many different acquiring relationships. That flexibility is exactly why ISOs and software platforms favour it — they control the merchant experience while shopping the back-end processing.
Key features
Tokenization & Customer Vault
Cards stored as PCI-compliant tokens — card-on-file and recurring billing without holding card numbers.
Recurring billing
Subscription and installment scheduling against vaulted tokens, with retry logic and reporting.
Omnichannel
One gateway for e-commerce, in-person EMV terminals, and mobile — unified reporting.
Fraud tools
Velocity rules, AVS/CVV filtering, and the iSpyFraud screening layer. See Fraud Defense.
200+ connections
Processor-agnostic routing to more than 200 acquirers and processors worldwide.
Developer API
Three-step and direct-post APIs, plus SDKs, for embedding payments in software and websites.
People also ask about the NMI payment gateway
Is NMI a payment processor or a gateway?
A gateway. The processor (Fiserv, Worldpay, TSYS) clears funds with Visa and Mastercard and moves money to the merchant's bank. The gateway is the software in front of that — it captures the card, encrypts and tokenizes it, runs fraud checks, and hands the transaction to whichever processor the merchant's account uses. NMI is deliberately processor-agnostic.
How much does the NMI gateway cost?
There is no single public price. Because NMI is sold through resellers who set their own pricing, what a merchant pays is a monthly gateway fee plus a small per-transaction gateway fee, layered on top of the processor's interchange-plus rate. Two merchants on NMI can pay quite different gateway fees depending on their reseller and volume.
What is the NMI Customer Vault?
It is NMI's tokenization service. Card data is stored as a token in a PCI-compliant vault rather than on the merchant's systems, so the merchant can bill returning and recurring customers without ever holding the card number. This shrinks PCI scope and is what makes card-on-file and subscription billing safe to run.
What it costs
NMI's pricing reaches merchants through resellers, so there is no flat published rate. In practice the gateway charges show up as:
- Monthly gateway fee — a fixed platform charge set by the reseller.
- Per-transaction gateway fee — a small flat fee per transaction, on top of processing.
- Processing cost — interchange-plus from the underlying processor, separate from the gateway fee.
- Optional add-ons — Customer Vault, advanced fraud, and certain integrations may carry extra fees depending on packaging.
Two businesses both "on NMI" can pay materially different gateway fees because the reseller, not NMI, sets the price. To know your cost, look at the statement from your payment company — the gateway line item is itemized there.
NMI is the software that keeps the merchant experience steady while the reseller shops the back-end processing.
FAQ
Is NMI a gateway or a processor?
A gateway. It captures and secures the transaction and routes it to a processor, which does the actual settlement. NMI connects to 200+ processors.
How much does it cost?
No single public price — resellers set pricing. Expect a monthly gateway fee plus a small per-transaction fee on top of processing. Your statement itemizes it.
What is the Customer Vault?
NMI's tokenization service — stores cards as tokens in a PCI-compliant vault for card-on-file and recurring billing without holding card numbers.
Where do I log in to the gateway?
nmi.com/logins, or your reseller's branded URL. See the NMI login guide.