OpenWallet Foundation
2 vendors are named alongside OpenWallet Foundation. 1 source references it, most recently WSO2 expands Agent Fabric and adds Forward Deployed Engineering (May 2026).
What is OpenWallet Foundation?
The OpenWallet Foundation is a collaborative initiative hosted by the Linux Foundation focused on open-source software components and reference designs for interoperable digital wallets across digital identity, payments, and other credential-based use cases.
- Open, reusable software components and reference architectures for digital wallets (digital identity and payments).
- Focus on interoperability for wallets, digital credentials, and ecosystems across sectors (interoperability framework).
- Vendor-neutral governance model with participation from enterprises, governments, and ecosystem providers (open-source foundation).
- Support for use cases such as identity credentials, payment instruments, and other verifiable data in digital wallets (identity and payments infrastructure).
- Alignment with open standards and profiles for secure, privacy-preserving credential storage and exchange where applicable (identity and security standards).
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More About Open Wallet Foundation
The OpenWallet Foundation (OWF) is an open-source foundation under the Linux Foundation that focuses on building reusable software components, reference implementations, and specifications for digital wallets. Its scope covers wallets that manage digital identity credentials, payment instruments, and other verifiable entitlements in a way that can be integrated into public- and private-sector services. OWF concentrates on the enabling infrastructure and common tooling rather than producing a single end-user wallet product.
From an enterprise perspective, OWF addresses the problem of fragmented wallet implementations and limited interoperability between identity, payments, and credential ecosystems. It promotes a shared, open technology base that organizations can adopt to build their own compliant and interoperable wallet solutions. This includes reference architectures for wallet back-ends and clients (application architecture), interfaces for interacting with credential issuers and verifiers (identity and access), and patterns for secure storage and presentation of wallet-held data (security and privacy).
OWF materials emphasize alignment with open standards where applicable, such as those in digital identity and verifiable credentials domains (identity standards). The foundation collaborates with member organizations and working groups to define interoperability profiles, APIs, and implementation guidelines that help different wallet implementations exchange credentials, support cross-border or cross-domain use cases, and integrate with existing identity and payment infrastructures. The approach is vendor-neutral and governed under open-source and open-governance principles (open-source governance).
Enterprises, financial institutions, public-sector agencies, and technology providers can use OWF outputs to shorten development cycles for wallet-related projects and to reduce custom integration overhead. By adopting shared components and reference designs, organizations can build wallets or wallet-enabled services that operate across multiple ecosystems, regulatory regimes, and device platforms (enterprise integration). Typical scenarios include citizen ID wallets, employee or customer credential wallets, payment-capable wallets, and sector-specific credential wallets for areas such as mobility or healthcare, depending on the implementations chosen by participants.
Within a technical taxonomy, the OpenWallet Foundation can be placed in categories such as digital identity infrastructure, Verifiable Credential (VC) wallets, and payment-enablement frameworks. Its work relates to secure client and server components, Application Programming Interface (API) specifications, credential lifecycle management, and conformance guidance for wallet ecosystems. OWF coordinates community contributions, maintains collaborative workstreams, and provides governance and documentation that enterprises can use as a basis for implementing compliant, interoperable digital wallet solutions.