Quotes captured 29 September 2026, 15:05–15:21 UTC · Bank deposit · Rates move — check the provider’s own screen before you pay
For €500 sent from Germany to a Nigerian bank account, the best quote we could rank was Taptap Send’s ₦777,500 and the lowest was Wise’s ₦771,494.79 — ₦6,005 apart, about €4, on the same €500. Western Union quoted less, ₦757,722.56, but is not ranked: the same page said bank payouts arrive in a US-dollar account, and we could not resolve which is true.
Below are the quotes six providers gave on their own public calculators within the same sixteen minutes, at €100, €500 and €1,000. Read the next section before the tables — it says exactly what kind of number these are, and what it takes to be ranked. Further down, the World Bank’s own price survey of this route shows each provider’s markup and how the cost has moved since 2023.
What these numbers are, and are not
- Public, logged-out calculator quotes. Each figure is what the provider’s own website showed to a visitor who was not signed in, on its Germany page. Once you sign in and reach checkout, the quote can differ — through promotions, verification limits or the payment method you pick.
- Not receipts. We did not send money. These are quotes, not proof of what arrived. A Nigerian bank can still take its own charge on the way in.
- Standard prices, not first-transfer offers. Where a provider showed a new-customer rate, it is reported separately — a returning customer never sees it.
A quote is ranked only if all four hold: the provider’s calculator displayed it, rather than us calculating it; the provider says it pays into a Nigerian bank account; nothing on the page puts the payout currency in doubt; and the total leaving your account is the amount in the heading. Ranked quotes are in order of naira received, and nothing else. Speed and payment method are shown alongside but do not change the order. Quotes that miss a rule are listed under each table with the reason.
Sending €500
| # | Provider | Recipient gets | Rate (1 EUR) | Fee | Paid by | Provider’s stated speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Taptap Send | ₦777,500 | 1,555.000 | “No transfer fees” | Not shown | “95% of our transfers are delivered in under 3 minutes” |
| 2 | Ria | ₦773,060.50 | 1,546.121 | €0.00 | Credit card | Not shown |
| 3 | WorldRemit | ₦771,684 | 1,543.3671 | €0 | Not shown | “Within 2 working days” |
| 4 | Wise | ₦771,494.79 | 1,556.50 | €4.34, taken from the €500 | Bank transfer | “Today – in 2 minutes” |
- Not ranked — Western Union, ₦757,722.56 at 1,515.4451, fee €0.00 (€2.99 shown struck through). Its page quoted naira but said a bank-account payout arrives “in their USD currency-supported account”. See the footnote below.
- Not ranked — Remitly. Its calculator shows only the new-customer rate at €500. See Remitly’s two rates.
Taptap Send’s calculator does not ask for a delivery method. Its Nigeria page says transfers go “to any Nigerian bank”, and that is the basis for ranking it here.
Sending €1,000
| # | Provider | Recipient gets | Rate (1 EUR) | Fee | Paid by | Provider’s stated speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Taptap Send | ₦1,555,000 | 1,555.000 | “No transfer fees” | Not shown | “95% of our transfers are delivered in under 3 minutes” |
| 2 | Ria | ₦1,546,121.00 | 1,546.121 | €0.00 | Credit card | Not shown |
| 3 | Wise | ₦1,544,639.47 | 1,556.50 | €7.62, taken from the €1,000 | Bank transfer | “Today – in 2 minutes” |
| 4 | WorldRemit | ₦1,543,367 | 1,543.3671 | €0 | Not shown | “Within 2 working days” |
- Not ranked — Remitly. Its calculator displayed ₦1,570,205.00, but that total includes the new-customer rate on the first €500. At its displayed standard rate of 1,554.66 a returning customer would get ₦1,554,660 — our calculation, not a figure the calculator showed. See Remitly’s two rates.
- Not quoted — Western Union. Its calculator would not return a bank-account quote at this amount.
Sending €100
| # | Provider | Recipient gets | Rate (1 EUR) | Fee | Paid by | Provider’s stated speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Taptap Send | ₦155,500 | 1,555.000 | “No transfer fees” | Not shown | “95% of our transfers are delivered in under 3 minutes” |
| 2 | WorldRemit | ₦154,337 | 1,543.3671 | €0 | Not shown | “Within 2 working days” |
| 3 | Wise | ₦152,972.82 | 1,556.50 | €1.72, taken from the €100 | Bank transfer | “Today – in 2 minutes” |
- Not ranked — Ria, ₦152,818.82 for €101.00. At €100 Ria’s rate drops to 1,528.1882 and a €1.00 fee is added on top, so a returning customer pays €101.00. The calculator showed a total of €100.00 only because it waived the fee for a first transfer. We did not quote a €100 total, so there is no like-for-like figure to rank.
- Not ranked — Remitly (new-customer rate only) and not quoted — Western Union (no quote at this amount).
Remitly’s two rates
Remitly’s calculator showed a welcome rate of 1,585.75 “applied to first 500 EUR of your transfer”, and a standard rate of 1,554.66 for the rest. The small print: “New customers only. One per customer. Limited time offer.”
| Send | New customer, first transfer (displayed) | Returning customer |
|---|---|---|
| €100 | ₦158,575.00 | Not shown by the calculator |
| €500 | ₦792,875.00 | Not shown by the calculator |
| €1,000 | ₦1,570,205.00 (first €500 at the welcome rate) | ₦1,554,660 — calculated at the displayed standard rate |
If this is your first Remitly transfer, the welcome rate beats everything else on this page. It is worth having — once. It is also exactly why it does not set the ranking: after that first transfer you are on the standard rate, and that is the price you will keep paying. We explain the pattern in first-transfer offers.
The returning-customer figure is the one we most want to replace with a displayed quote. Remitly’s small print says the standard rate “applies when you pay by Easy bank transfer” for amounts over €500. We have not seen that rate on a checkout screen, so Remitly stays out of the ranking until we have.
Providers we could not quote
- MoneyGram. Its Germany site offers only a sending and receiving country, then a sign-up prompt. There is no amount field, so there is no logged-out quote to read.
- LemFi. Its Germany page loaded, but the public calculator stayed on euro to euro. Choosing Nigerian naira did not change it.
- Western Union at €100 and €1,000. On a second load the calculator stopped responding to the amount and appeared to switch to cash pickup, so only the first €500 bank-account quote was recorded.
Being absent from the tables says nothing about whether these are good or bad choices. It means we could not read a quote on the day.
A Western Union footnote worth reading
On the €500 bank-account quote, Western Union’s page attached this footnote to “Bank account”: “Your receiver will receive the money in their USD currency-supported account.” The same page quoted the amount received in naira. We cannot tell from the page which is right, so the quote is not ranked. If you use Western Union for a bank payout, ask before you send which currency the account will be credited in.
For context: Taptap Send’s Nigeria page states that after a February 2024 Central Bank of Nigeria directive, money transfer operators stopped paying into domiciliary US-dollar accounts in Nigeria. That suggests the footnote may be out of date — but it is another provider’s account, not Western Union’s, and we have not confirmed it with Western Union. The CBN’s own rule, that money transfer operators pay recipients in naira, is quoted in can your family in Nigeria receive dollars? Western Union’s page still showed the same footnote on 10 October 2026.
A second footnote says money is “generally” deposited “3-5 bank business days from the time the money is received into the WU PAY bank account” — longer than the “1–2 Business days” in the same quote.
Why there is no markup column
On our other routes we measure each provider’s rate against an independent benchmark and show the gap as a markup. For naira the benchmark our methodology names is the ECB’s euro–dollar rate multiplied by the Central Bank of Nigeria’s dollar–naira rate. On this capture that gave 1 EUR = ₦1,511.16 — the ECB’s 1.1355 for 29 September, times the CBN’s central rate of 1,330.8292 for 28 September, the latest it had published.
Every provider’s rate was above that figure — from Western Union at 0.3% above to Wise at 3.0% above. A provider paying more than a benchmark is not impossible in itself. But this benchmark joins two central banks’ rates from different days, and we have not shown that it reflects the rate providers actually obtain naira at. Until we have, we are not publishing a markup for this route. The ranking does not depend on it: it is by amount received, which is the number that matters to the person in Nigeria.
What the World Bank’s price survey shows for this route
The World Bank checks prices on Germany to Nigeria every quarter for its Remittance Prices Worldwide database. Its researchers record each provider’s fee and exchange rate for sending €140 and €345 — its local equivalents of US$200 and US$500 — and measure the rate against a market reference rate. Unlike our naira benchmark, that produces a markup for every provider, so it fills the gap explained above.
Two cautions. The latest survey was collected 8–26 August 2025, more than a year before our quotes, so it shows the longer pattern, not today’s price. And it covers a different set of providers: Wise is not in it, and Paysend, Sendwave, MoneyGram and ATL Money Transfer are. The figures below are the World Bank’s; we have not re-checked them.
August 2025: cost of each option
Total cost is the fee plus the exchange-rate margin, as a percentage of the amount sent. A negative figure means the provider’s rate was better than the World Bank’s reference rate. All options are online unless marked as through an agent.
| Provider and option | Fee on €140 | Rate margin | Total cost, €140 | Total cost, €345 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Taptap Send — debit card, to bank account | €0 | −0.18% | −0.18% | −0.18% |
| Sendwave — debit card, to bank account or mobile wallet | €0 | 0.27% | 0.27% | 0.27% |
| Paysend — bank transfer or debit card, to bank account | €0 | 0.50% | 0.50% | 0.50% |
| WorldRemit — any payment method, to bank account | €0 | 0.73% | 0.73% | 0.73% |
| Remitly — any payment method, to bank account or cash pickup | €0 | 1.49% | 1.49% | 1.49% |
| Ria — to bank account | €0.90 | 0.87% | 1.51% | 1.13% |
| MoneyGram — bank transfer or debit card, to bank account | €1.99 | 0.41% | 1.83% | 1.28% |
| Western Union — to bank account | €1.99 | 1.01% | 2.43% | 1.59% |
| Ria — card, to cash pickup | €0.99 | 2.02% | 2.73% | 2.31% |
| Western Union — card, to cash pickup | €3.99 | 1.01% | 3.86% | 2.17% |
| Postbank via Western Union — bank transfer, to cash pickup | €3.99 | 2.75% | 5.60% | 3.91% |
| Western Union — cash at an agent, to cash pickup | €8.40 | 3.32% | 9.33% | 7.35% |
| ATL Money Transfer — card, to bank account | €0 | 15.85–16.13% | 15.85–16.13% | 15.85–16.13% |
MoneyGram’s other options ranged from 1.49% (debit card to cash pickup) to 2.32% (credit card to cash pickup) on €140. The World Bank’s average across every option was 2.85%, well under the 6.36% the UN reports as the global average cost of sending $200 in the same quarter.
What the survey shows
- Walking into an agent costs the most. Paying cash at a Western Union agent cost 9.33% on €140 — about €13 — against 2.43% for Western Union’s own online bank-account option. Only ATL Money Transfer, whose cost was almost all in the exchange rate, cost more.
- Fixed fees weigh most on small transfers. Western Union’s online bank-account option cost 2.43% on €140 and 1.59% on €345; Ria’s cost 1.51% and 1.13%. Providers with no fee cost the same percentage at both amounts. See one large transfer or several small ones.
- Cash pickup usually costs more than a bank deposit. At Western Union by card, 3.86% against 2.43%; at Ria, 2.73% against 1.51%. MoneyGram was the exception: by debit card, cash pickup was cheaper than a bank deposit. More on the choice in bank deposit, cash pickup or mobile wallet.
- Credit cards cost the same as debit cards at most providers that take both. MoneyGram was the clear exception: to a bank account, 2.11% by credit card against 1.83% by debit card. The survey does not include any charge your card issuer adds — see bank transfer, debit card or credit card.
How the cost has moved since 2023
| Survey | Collected | Average cost, €140 (World Bank) | Middle option (our calculation) | Providers |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q3 2025 | 8–26 Aug 2025 | 2.85% | 1.51% | 10 |
| Q2 2025 | No data published for this route | |||
| Q1 2025 | 17–28 Feb 2025 | 4.01% | 3.22% | 6 |
| Q4 2024 | 18 Nov–4 Dec 2024 | 6.10% | 3.33% | 6 |
| Q3 2024 | 20 Aug–3 Sep 2024 | 4.74% | 3.72% | 6 |
| Q2 2024 | 15–31 May 2024 | 7.44% | 7.02% | 7 |
| Q1 2024 | 1 Jan–18 Mar 2024 | 1.97% | 2.69% | 7 |
| Q4 2023 | 21 Nov–5 Dec 2023 | 2.37% | 3.21% | 8 |
| Q3 2023 | 19 Aug–10 Sep 2023 | 2.98% | 2.92% | 9 |
The middle option is the median: half the options the World Bank priced that quarter cost less, half cost more. We show it because a few extreme records pull the average around. In late 2024 one option cost 29.7%, lifting the average to 6.10% while the middle option was 3.33%. In 2023 and early 2024 the opposite happened: some records show providers paying far more naira than the World Bank’s reference rate — up to 41% more in late 2023 — which pulls the average down.
The UN’s Sustainable Development Goal 10.c aims to bring the cost of sending remittances under 3% by 2030, and to eliminate routes costing more than 5%. On this route the World Bank average was under 3% in four of the eight surveys shown, including the latest. In every survey, the cheapest options cost far less than the average. The route’s average says little about the price you pay; the provider and option you choose decide it.
What this page does not tell you
- Today’s price. These are the quotes at one moment on 29 September. The provider’s own screen at the moment you pay is the only live figure.
- Like-for-like payment methods. Ria’s figures are for a credit card — its page lists cards, Klarna, Apple Pay and Google Pay, but no bank transfer. Taptap Send and WorldRemit did not show a payment method at all. A card issuer can add its own charge; the quote cannot show that.
- How long it really takes. Speeds above are the providers’ own words. We break down where the time actually goes in how long a transfer to Nigeria takes.
- What the Nigerian bank deducts. None of these quotes can show it.
Before you send, the pre-send checklist covers the details that stop a transfer — and the account-number check catches the most common one.
How we captured this
Every figure was read off the provider’s own public calculator and recorded with the time it appeared, between 15:05 and 15:21 UTC on 29 September 2026. The browser was in Finland, so each provider’s Germany page or Germany sending option was selected by hand. That mattered: WorldRemit first priced the transfer as Finland, at a slightly different rate, and those figures were discarded.
Each quote was checked by arithmetic — amount after fee, times the rate — and every row matches the provider’s own total. Where a figure is our calculation rather than something the calculator displayed, the page says “calculated”, and calculated figures are never ranked. A screenshot and a timestamped text record of every quote is kept on file.
Sources
- Provider calculators, Germany pages: Wise, Remitly, WorldRemit (with “Germany EUR” selected), Western Union, Ria, and Taptap Send (with “Germany (EUR)” selected).
- Taptap Send’s Nigeria page — delivery to Nigerian banks, delivery-speed claim and the note on the February 2024 directive.
- European Central Bank euro reference rates, 29 September 2026.
- Central Bank of Nigeria exchange rates, 28 September 2026.
- The World Bank, Remittance Prices Worldwide, available at http://remittanceprices.worldbank.org — Germany to Nigeria, surveys Q3 2023 to Q3 2025, read 30 September 2026. The medians are our calculation from the World Bank’s records. The World Bank does not endorse this site or its use of the data.
- United Nations, Sustainable Development Goal 10 — target 10.c and the Q3 2025 global average cost of sending $200.
Afromium does not make test transfers and has no commercial relationship with any provider on this page. This is general information about quotes shown at one moment, not advice on which provider to use. Rates, fees and offers change constantly — confirm the final amount on the provider’s own screen before you pay.