ZBD — The money layer for games

Why ZBD

Three things no general-purpose payments platform gives a game.

Every other option was built for another industry and adapted. ZBD was built for the shape of money inside games.

The cash-out stays in the game

Verification, payout method and cash-out all happen in your screens, in your brand. No hosted portal, no hand-off where players quietly give up.

Elsewhere: a portal to log into, or a provider-branded sign-up at the moment they want their money.

You choose who pays the fee

Absorb the fee, share it, or let the earner carry it at cash-out. With nothing to cap, there is no reason for a $100 minimum — so the long tail gets paid.

Elsewhere: the platform is billed, so it sets a threshold — and the threshold decides who gets paid.

A game economy, not a bank account

A game currency worth real money, one ledger that knows where every unit came from, and players trading with each other, compliantly.

Elsewhere: a business account with a number. No in-game ledger, no player-to-player.

The platform

Start with payouts. Grow into the full money lifecycle.

Embedded Payouts is live today. Embedded Accounts adds pay-in and peer-to-peer on the same foundation.

Live now

Embedded Payouts

Instant, compliant cash-out for players and creators, inside the game. One integration, every payout method they want, and no scheduled runs.

Bank transfer (USD, EUR), Cash App, Coinbase, gift cards, push-to-card
Real-time and event-driven — pay the round winner when the round ends
Configurable fee model and game-friendly minimums
KYC, AML, sanctions screening and fraud protection handled by ZBD
Drop-in cash-out screen, Unity plugin, or full API

Explore Embedded Payouts →

Early access · Q1 2027

Embedded Accounts

A licensed financial layer inside your game. Everything Payouts does, plus deposits and player-to-player value — the economy layer that turns a payout into a relationship.

Money inDeposits, top-ups, converted balances

Money throughP2P, marketplaces, creator economies

Money outOn-demand cash-out, any rail

Issue and manage game currencies worth real money
One ledger for virtual and cashable balances, with source tagging, holds and reversals
Compliant player-to-player trading and creator marketplaces
Own the financial relationship with every player, not just your creators

Join the Accounts early-access programme →

Who it's for

Built for the people who actually pay players and creators.

Enterprise creator programmes

Tens of thousands of creators, a published minimum, and onboarding complaints in the community. Replace the portal with an in-game flow, one segment at a time.

Creator payouts →

Esports & prize money

Licensed for real-money gaming flows. Where a prize rides on the result, most payment platforms can't pay it. We can — in-game, on demand.

Prize payouts →

Studios with live economies

Tradeable items, player markets, in-game currencies. Make a slice of your economy cashable — compliantly — without handing it to a bank.

Game economies →

UGC, modding & trading platforms

You have the creators to pay and the trades to make legal. Too small for a corporate bank's RFP; exactly the right size for us.

Platform payouts →

The threshold problem

What a minimum actually costs you.

Payout minimums exist because someone pays per payout. Put your numbers in — the shape of the problem is the same everywhere.

Earners on your platform

Average monthly earning ($)

Current payout minimum ($)

Assumption: the median earner makes % of the average — creator and player earnings are long-tailed.

Illustrative. Your distribution will differ — the shape won't.

5 monthsbefore the median earner first reaches $100

With no minimum: everyone who earned gets paid this month.

How this is calculated

Monthly earnings per earner are modelled as lognormal with your mean and median: σ = √(2·ln(mean/median)), μ = ln(median). The share of earners below a threshold T is Φ((ln T − μ)/σ), where Φ is the standard normal CDF, computed with the Abramowitz–Stegun 7.1.26 erf approximation. The median wait is ⌈T / median⌉ months. A blank field shows “—” rather than assuming zero.

Build vs buy

Why not build it yourself?

The build

An engineering team on wallets, KYC and payouts for a year before the first cash-out — then forever, because money code is never finished.

The compliance

Money-transmission licences, sanctions screening and tax reporting stop being a vendor's problem and become yours, in every market you operate.

What you end up with

A bank account with a game logo on it, not a game economy: no in-game currency worth real money, no ledger, no player-to-player.

ZBD is the finished version, licensed, inside your game in days.

Honest comparison

Adapted for games, or built for them.

Most payout infrastructure was designed for gig workers, marketplaces, suppliers or corporate treasury. It works — until the player is the one being paid.

The moment that matters

Adapted platforms

ZBD

Where the cash-out happens

A hosted portal, a provider-branded sign-up, or a supplier form.Gig-economy payout portals · marketplace platforms · AP tools

Inside the game, in your screens. The in-game flow is the only flow.

Who pays the fee

The platform is billed, so the platform sets a minimum.Publisher-billed models with partial or no pass-through

Your choice — including the earner's own linked account. No cost to cap, no reason for a threshold.

When they get paid

Daily batches, scheduled runs, or "when your balance reaches $100".Enterprise payout patterns

On demand, real-time, event-driven. Round winner, round paid.

What the player gets

A bank account with a number.Corporate finance platforms

A game currency worth real money, a ledger that knows where every unit came from, and players who can trade with each other.

Prize money

Often excluded by the provider's own terms.

Licensed for real-money gaming flows, with esports prizes as a core case.

Who they'll serve

Large accounts above a commercial threshold.

Any size of studio — from a mid-market title to an enterprise creator programme.

Where the alternatives are stronger — global coverage today, deep creator tax automation, finance-calendar payment runs — we'll tell you, and we'll tell you how we close the gap.

Proof

Live in production. Licensed where it counts.

US + EEAMoney Transmitter Licences across US states; EMI and CASP under MiCAR across the EEA

Real-timeEvent-driven payouts on ACH (US) and SEPA (EU) rails, in production

4M+Gamers who have used ZBD-powered rewards and payouts

$90mRaised from RAINE, Square Enix and Lakestar

Customer story

How a leading publisher took creator cash-out in-game and dropped the payout threshold

Case study in preparation. Placeholder for the first named Embedded Payouts customer — the results, the migration, and what changed for the long tail of creators.

Ask for the early results

Developers

Drop it in. Ship in a week.

A drop-in cash-out screen, a Unity plugin, or a full API — whichever fits your stack. ZBD handles accounts, verification and payouts; you keep the player.

Drop-in cash-out screenOne call opens a branded cash-out flow inside your game. No payout UI to build.

Unity pluginPrefab in, prefab out. About 2 MB, 5–7 day integrations are typical.

Payouts & Accounts APIServer-side control of balances, limits and payouts. SDKs in TypeScript, Go, Rust and C#.

Read the docs Get sandbox keys

// Unity — pay the round winner, then open cash-out
var zbd = ZbdSdk.Init("sk_test_your_key_here");

await zbd.Payouts.Send(new Payout {
  PlayerId = winner.Id,
  Amount   = Money.USD(12.00m),
  Reason   = "tournament_prize"
});

zbd.Cashout.Open(winner.Id); // prefab UI, your brand

// Pay the round winner the moment the round ends
await zbd.payouts.send({
  playerId: winner.id,
  amount:   { value: 12.00, currency: 'USD' },
  reason:   'tournament_prize',
  feePayer: 'player'       // or 'publisher' | 'split'
});

// Open the in-game cash-out screen
zbd.cashout.open({ playerId: winner.id });

# REST — one call per payout (sandbox)
curl https://api.zbd.example/v1/payouts \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer sk_test_your_key_here" \
  -d playerId=plr_8842 \
  -d amount=12.00 -d currency=USD \
  -d reason=tournament_prize

Trust & compliance

Everything your procurement team will ask for, on one page.

Licensed to move money in the world's largest games markets

ZBD is a regulated payment institution, not a software layer on someone else's licence. Compliance, KYC and fraud controls are ours to run, so they aren't yours to build.

United StatesMoney Transmitter Licences · NMLS ID 2188007

European Economic AreaElectronic Money Institution · CASP under MiCAR · PSD2

SecuritySOC 2 Type II · annual audits

ControlsKYC/AML, sanctions screening, real-time fraud detection

Built to be diligenced

Security documentation, penetration test summaries, data handling and sub-processor lists, SLAs and support model — available on request for enterprise evaluations.

Security and architecture documentation pack
Data residency and retention policies
Enterprise SLAs and named support
Licence coverage by jurisdiction, kept current

Request the trust pack →

DESIGN NOTE · THE HEADLINE

Today, on zbdpay.com

"The Money Layer for Games."

Embedded, licensed financial infrastructure that powers the money lifecycle inside your game and turns it into a driver of engagement, revenue, and loyalty.

This concept

Your players cash out inside your game.

No portal to leave. No minimum to reach.

Why it's written this way

It's in the buyer's words. No publisher wants "a money layer"; they have creators complaining about a portal and a minimum. The headline names the outcome they already want.
Only ZBD can say it. "Infrastructure that powers the money lifecycle" could be any payments company. "Cash out inside your game" is the one thing the alternatives don't do.
It names the enemy without naming anyone. Portal and threshold are the two pains every creator programme recognises; the reader knows who this is against.
It's provable. The demo underneath shows the claim happening in eight seconds. A headline should be something you can demonstrate.

"The money layer for games" keeps its job as the category line above the headline. The headline is the promise.

Your players cash out inside your game.