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Correct. A digital Opal Card is coming later in the year...

"A digital Opal Card rollout is also expected to kick off by the end of this year as NSW moves through $567.9 million worth of transport upgrades.

This will introduce a digital version of the physical Opal transit card and allow people to add a virtual Opal card to digital wallets on their devices"
At least something is coming. So so many times when I pass the gate, people using Their phone with express transit takes longer to sort out reader issues compared to me just tapping opal and go.
With that being said, idk if that digital opal card can be used on Apple Watch. Will have to wait and see.
 
High? Which are those?
The floor-to-ceiling ones with the interlocking bars. They're very user-hostile and slow. The one time someone barged through after my MetroCard swipe (this was a few years ago) it was with one of those. If I recall it was an unlimited card so I didn't lose money but was locked out until the 20 minute thing on my card reset.
 
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The floor-to-ceiling ones with the interlocking bars. They're very user-hostile and slow. The one time someone barged through after my MetroCard swipe (this was a few years ago) it was with one of those. If I recall it was an unlimited card so I didn't lose money but was locked out until the 20 minute thing on my card reset.
Oh DUHH, one of those — right. Yes, those are horrible and clumsy. I can't imagine what an elderly person must think when trying to push that thing. Damn unlimited time limit... I've gotten screwed a couple of times like that. I usually just go to the station staff in the booth if there are any...
 
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With that being said, idk if that digital opal card can be used on Apple Watch. Will have to wait and see.
The Opal+ trial that ended last month allowed participants to add the card to the Apple Watch, so presumably the digital card would be the same.
 
Don't forget, a state with a population of 5 million people spent $1.5 billion on that system.

That's what happens when a corrupt government hands out contracts to their friends.

Every time I think of Myki my blood boils. Instead of buying an off-the-shelf solution from a company with a track record of implementing world-class ticketing systems, we paid significantly more money to a company who’d never built a ticketing system to custom-build one of the worst ticketing systems the world has ever seen.

I remember when it first launched, I sat there holding my myki to the reader for 5 seconds before the gate would open. The queues at Flinders st were insane. So much slower than metcards which were validated basically instantly.

Meanwhile, in the same year, London was already beginning to accept contactless payments.

It’s ****ing embarrassing.
 
Every time I think of Myki my blood boils. Instead of buying an off-the-shelf solution from a company with a track record of implementing world-class ticketing systems, we paid significantly more money to a company who’d never built a ticketing system to custom-build one of the worst ticketing systems the world has ever seen.

I remember when it first launched, I sat there holding my myki to the reader for 5 seconds before the gate would open. The queues at Flinders st were insane. So much slower than metcards which were validated basically instantly.

Meanwhile, in the same year, London was already beginning to accept contactless payments.

It’s ****ing embarrassing.

Yeah it's hard to even talk about it... Apparently we're getting contactless payment in 2025. I was in London last year and I just tapped my watch on the reader and it was instant. It was cool, but bittersweet.
 
Thanks for clarifying.

I know people in the US don’t refer to “New Mexico” as “Mexico” because they border each other and that would be confusing.

But since NSW and Wales are about as far away from each other as they can be and still be on the same planet, I wasn’t sure what the convention was in Australia.
You know as an Australian, its never even occurred to me to think about it like that! Of course Australia is littered with place names from European colonisation and a fair share of badly translated aboriginal names too.
 
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I don’t think you can add the actual Opal card to your wallet but rather be able to use Express Transit with your credit cards
Correct. Macroumors has not read through the NSW Gov’s transport website causing confusion. I hope they fix this.
THEY FIXED IT WHILE I WAS AWAITING MODERATOR APPROVAL. I’m going to leave this post as is.

Go to -
or using your search engine of choice, search for "NSW Transport", on new page find and click on "Transport News” and all the details are there.

Follow their instructions. After tapping Transit Cards Settings, a new window allows you to choose which card you wish to use by tapping on it, or the option of “None”.

These instructions are for Apple’s Contactless Payments "Express Mode" in regard to NSW's Transport System.

Epress Mode.png
 
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It's very smart of Apple to do this. They won't make any money from this kind of deal but it eventually locks people into their iPhones further so they can't switch away easily. Use your iPhone as a transit payment method, credit card, driver's license, car key, house key, etc. Suddenly, one day, you depend on your iPhone for pretty much everything and it's impossible to switch.

Luckily, I'm an AAPL shareholder so lock away.
I'm a resident of Sydney. It wasn't Apple who did it. It was always available. It was up to the NSW Government to switch the access on for Opal readers, like it had already done with Android phones some time ago.
 
If this works as a standard tap transaction, just minus the need to authenticate, what type of bank cards would not support the feature? Or do you mean if the bank card does not support Apple Pay?
Yeah but authentication is a pain when you are in rush. On watch: Double tap, select card, tap. On phone: Double tap, wait till the phone scan your face, select card, tap. I done that thousand of times, and 10% of those time I either select wrong card, or authentication failed and I wasted another second while the train is starting to move.

So yeah if this worked isntantly without needing to switch on my device, I welcome it.

Edit: I tried it today and it works flawlessly. Great job NSW government to enable this. Basically I whipped out my phone from pocket and press it to reader while I watching Netflix on iPad as I walked past. 1 sec is all it takes.
 
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Haha no. The other commenter is confused. NSW or "New South Wales". Never heard it called anything else (other than derogatory profanity 😂).
We just call it Sydney😂

But seriously, express mode is fantastic especially while using Apple Watch. There’s absolutely no reason to buy an Adult Opal card anymore when you can just use your bank card. I’ve totally ditched my physical wallet since Covid started (thanks to now also having our driving license on the phone too).
 
We just call it Sydney😂

But seriously, express mode is fantastic especially while using Apple Watch. There’s absolutely no reason to buy an Adult Opal card anymore when you can just use your bank card. I’ve totally ditched my physical wallet since Covid started (thanks to now also having our driving license on the phone too).
Yes! And you don't need to authenticate your watch anymore (ie. double click the button). Tried it without looking or touching your watch and the reader, as you walk pass press the watch to the reader and voila the gate is open. Much better than before.
 
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