Amazon will allow all Whole Foods customers to pay for shopping with their palms by the end of this year, as demand for its biometric technology grows.

Amazon One, biometric technology that lets users pay for items by scanning their hand, has reportedly seen “growing demand” since its launch in Amazon Go stores in 2018. 

Once shoppers have connected their palm to a particular credit card, they are free to enter and pay for things in-store with a swipe of their hand. 

Amazon acquired Whole Foods Market for $13.7bn in 2017. At the time, it shocked the retail industry as it was one of the first times a tech giant had bought a popular grocery chain.

Amazon One will be available in all 500 US Whole Foods stores by the end of the year, adding to the 200 Whole Foods it’s already operating in. 

According to Amazon, its biometric technology is being used by over 3 million users and demand is growing. 

Amazon Web Services (AWS), the technology giant’s cloud division, has been selling its biometric technology to a range of third parties. These include stores in airports, concert venues and stadiums and more. 

AWS is currently the most successful part of Amazon, reportedly pulling in over $80bn in revenues in 2022 and almost $23bn in operating profit.

According to research analyst GlobalData, Amazon as a whole reported revenue of $513bn in 2022 – hiring over 1.5 million employees globally.

The news comes as investment in cloud technology declined last year, totalling $125bn, which was down from a $183bn peak in 2021, according to GlobalData.

Investment in cloud technology totalled $132bn in 2019, before falling to $116bn in 2020.