CBDC projects around the world have moved past white papers. More than 130 jurisdictions are now researching, building, piloting, or issuing central bank digital currencies, according to 2025 tracking by the Atlantic Council, BIS-linked surveys, and policy reviews. The headline number can mislead you, though. Only a small group of countries has live national CBDCs. The most meaningful activity is happening in large pilots, wholesale settlement trials, and cross-border platforms.

The practical question is not whether CBDCs are being studied. They are. The better question is which CBDC projects around the world are actually processing value, testing real users, or changing payment infrastructure.

What Counts as a CBDC Project?

A central bank digital currency is digital money issued or backed by a central bank. It is not a stablecoin, a bank deposit, or a cryptoasset. In most designs, a CBDC is a direct sovereign monetary instrument, even when private banks or payment firms help distribute it.

Retail CBDC vs Wholesale CBDC

Retail CBDC: Used by individuals, merchants, and businesses for payments. Examples include the Sand Dollar, eNaira, JAM-DEX, and China's e-CNY pilot.
Wholesale CBDC: Used by banks and financial institutions for interbank payments, securities settlement, collateral movement, or cross-border liquidity.

This distinction matters. Retail CBDCs get public attention, but wholesale CBDCs may reach production sooner in advanced economies because they solve narrower problems with fewer consumer privacy concerns.

Global CBDC Activity in 2025 and 2026

Recent global trackers converge on one point. CBDC exploration is close to universal. A 2025 overview counted 137 countries with some form of CBDC work, while a U.S. Congressional brief citing the Atlantic Council reported 108 jurisdictions in research, pilot, or launch phases as of July 2025. Other surveys estimate that countries covering roughly 98 percent of global GDP are testing or developing CBDCs.

Live national rollouts remain rare. The IMF identifies three officially issued retail CBDCs used for domestic payments: the Bahamas' Sand Dollar, Nigeria's eNaira, and Jamaica's JAM-DEX. Some trackers classify the Eastern Caribbean DCash differently, which is why global launch counts vary.

That classification issue is not academic. If you are comparing CBDC projects around the world, check whether the tracker counts pilots, regional currency unions, limited launches, or full national issuance. Otherwise you will compare unlike systems.

Countries with Live Retail CBDCs

Bahamas: Sand Dollar

The Bahamas launched the Sand Dollar nationally in October 2020, making it one of the first live retail CBDCs. It was built partly to improve payment access across an island geography where cash logistics are expensive.

Usage is steady but modest. A 2026 update reported Sand Dollar transactions of roughly 2 million Bahamian dollars per month. That is real activity, not a laboratory demo, but it stays small beside traditional payment channels.

Nigeria: eNaira

Nigeria launched the eNaira in October 2021, one of the earliest major emerging-market CBDCs. By 2026, cumulative transaction value was reported at about 22 billion naira.

The hard lesson from Nigeria is simple. Issuance does not guarantee adoption. Merchant acceptance, wallet onboarding, public trust, and competition from existing mobile payments all matter. If a user already has a convenient bank app or a mobile money wallet, a CBDC must solve a specific problem. A central bank logo alone is not enough.

Jamaica: JAM-DEX

Jamaica launched JAM-DEX in July 2022 and has continued distribution through local financial institutions and merchants. By mid 2026, reported transaction activity reached around 300 million Jamaican dollars.

JAM-DEX shows a pattern seen in other live CBDCs. The system works, but scale takes time. Incentives can bring first use. Habit change is harder.

Large CBDC Pilots in Major Economies

China: e-CNY or Digital Yuan

China's e-CNY is the largest retail CBDC pilot by value processed. Large-scale trials began in April 2020 and have expanded across cities, retail scenarios, transit systems, e-commerce platforms, and public-sector payments.

By 2026, reported cumulative e-CNY pilot volume exceeded 7 trillion yuan. That makes it the most important live CBDC experiment to watch, even though any claim of a formal national legal tender rollout should be treated carefully unless confirmed by official policy sources.

The e-CNY also matters because it is being tested in cross-border settings, including links with mBridge. That puts China at the intersection of retail CBDC, wholesale settlement, and trade payment experimentation.

India: Digital Rupee or e-Rupee

India operates both wholesale and retail digital rupee pilots. The wholesale pilot began in November 2022, followed by retail trials involving banks, consumers, and merchants.

India's retail pilot has reportedly reached peaks above 1 million daily transactions. That is significant test scale. The key design challenge is integration with India's existing payment stack, especially UPI, which is already fast, cheap, and widely adopted. To be blunt, a retail CBDC in India must offer more than another QR payment option.

Brazil: Drex

Brazil's Drex project is one of the more interesting CBDC designs because it is not just a digital cash pilot. Drex focuses on tokenized deposits, programmable settlement, tokenized assets, and wholesale-style financial infrastructure. The pilot has been extended into 2026.

This is the right direction for Brazil. Drex is less about replacing Pix for everyday payments and more about building regulated tokenization rails for financial assets. That makes it a useful case study for professionals interested in tokenized finance.

Euro Area: Digital Euro

The European Central Bank entered a two-year preparation phase for a potential digital euro in October 2023. The work includes rulebook development, vendor selection, privacy design, offline functionality, and coordination with EU legislation.

As of the latest official-oriented assessments, the digital euro remains pre-launch. Some industry reports have claimed a 2026 launch, but formal trackers still describe the project as awaiting an issuance decision. For now, treat the digital euro as advanced preparation, not a live public CBDC.

United Kingdom: Digital Pound

The Bank of England has studied a digital pound and completed a public consultation process that began in 2023. The project remains in a design phase, with no pilot launch or final issuance decision.

The UK case highlights the political side of CBDCs. Privacy, bank deposits, access rules, and the role of commercial banks are not minor details. They determine whether a retail CBDC is acceptable to the public.

Wholesale and Cross-Border CBDC Projects to Watch

mBridge

Project mBridge, coordinated through the BIS Innovation Hub, is the most advanced multi-CBDC cross-border settlement platform. Participants include the central banks of China, Hong Kong, Thailand, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia.

By January 2026, mBridge had processed more than 55 billion U.S. dollars equivalent across roughly 4,000 transactions. That puts it ahead of most CBDC pilots in real settlement value. Its use cases include trade payments, wholesale settlement, and cross-border liquidity.

Project Dunbar

Project Dunbar involved Singapore, Australia, Malaysia, and South Africa. It demonstrated that banks in different jurisdictions could transact directly using domestic CBDCs on a shared platform.

The prototype did not become a global production network, but it answered a core technical question. Multi-CBDC settlement can work without every payment moving through traditional correspondent banking chains.

Project Icebreaker

Project Icebreaker, involving Sweden, Norway, Israel, and the BIS Nordic Innovation Hub, tested interoperability between retail CBDC systems. Its hub-and-spoke model routes cross-border payments through a common foreign exchange layer.

This is a practical design choice. Most countries will not run the same CBDC ledger, so interoperability will matter more than a single global platform.

Other Wholesale Pilots

Switzerland: Project Helvetia III tests wholesale tokenized Swiss franc settlement for securities markets.
Philippines: Project Agila focuses on wholesale CBDC use cases for interbank settlement.
South Africa: Project Khokha 2x explores large-value payments and securities settlement.

One detail that often trips teams in these pilots is reconciliation. A CBDC settlement leg may finalize in seconds, while the securities leg, compliance checks, or core banking batch process still follows older timing. The technology can be fast. The institution around it may not be.

Why Some CBDC Projects Slow Down or Stop

Not every CBDC proof of concept should become a national currency system. BIS and IMF research repeatedly warn that poor CBDC design can affect bank funding, privacy, financial stability, and payment competition.

Several projects have been paused or cancelled after early experimentation. That is not failure. It is evidence that central banks are doing what they should do: testing assumptions before changing monetary infrastructure.

The United States is the clearest policy contrast. A 2026 policy review states that the GENIUS Act, passed in July 2025, prohibits the Federal Reserve from issuing a general-purpose retail CBDC to the public. U.S. activity has instead centered on research, private-sector payment innovation, stablecoin policy, and possible wholesale experiments.

What CBDC Projects Mean for Blockchain and Digital Asset Professionals

If you work in blockchain, payments, compliance, or digital assets, CBDCs are worth studying for three reasons.

Tokenization is becoming institutional. Projects like Drex and Helvetia show how regulated tokenized money can support tokenized securities and deposits.
Interoperability is the real problem. mBridge, Dunbar, and Icebreaker all point to the same issue: domestic systems need shared rules for cross-border use.
Compliance is built into the design. CBDCs must handle AML controls, sanctions screening, transaction limits, privacy tiers, and auditability from day one.

For deeper study, Blockchain Council's Certified Blockchain Expert™ is a useful starting point for CBDC architecture and distributed ledger fundamentals. If your focus is digital money, stablecoins, and market structure, consider the Certified Cryptocurrency Expert™. Developers who want to understand smart contracts, token standards, and programmable settlement can look at Certified Blockchain Developer™ or Certified Smart Contract Developer™ as related learning paths.

Outlook: Where CBDC Projects Go Next

The next phase of CBDC projects around the world will not be one giant retail rollout. Expect a mixed path.

Wholesale CBDCs will likely advance first in securities settlement, collateral movement, and interbank payment systems.
Cross-border platforms such as mBridge will expand testing because they address a real pain point: slow and costly international settlement.
Retail CBDCs in advanced economies will move slowly due to privacy, banking-sector, and political concerns.
Emerging markets will keep testing retail CBDCs for inclusion and payment efficiency, but adoption will depend on merchant networks and user trust.

The countries leading today are not only the ones with live CBDCs. The Bahamas, Nigeria, and Jamaica proved issuance is possible. China and India are proving large-scale pilots can process serious volume. Brazil, Switzerland, and BIS-led projects are showing where wholesale CBDCs may create the strongest near-term value.

If you want to build expertise now, study both sides: retail payment design and wholesale tokenized settlement. Then map one CBDC pilot to its real infrastructure choices, such as wallet model, settlement finality, privacy tiering, and interoperability. That exercise will teach you more than reading another launch announcement.

CBDC Projects Around the World: Countries Leading Digital Currency Pilots