Taking Bitcoin for Payment in California is Now Legal

A few weeks ago, California officially annulled a law that forbade the use of any currency other than the United States’ legal tender, such as community currencies, loyalty program points, or bitcoin. This old law had predominantly gone unnoticed, with numerous business owners based in Silicon Valley beginning to accept this form of digital currency in exchange for goods and services, oblivious to its former illegality.

This innovative group includes renowned owners of establishments such as Ramen Underground, Sake Zone, and Buyer’s Best Friend in San Francisco, Ocean Blue Sushi Club in Sunnyvale, Nova Rosti in San Rafael, Coupa Café in Palo Alto, and several Curry Up Now locations.

I recently had the opportunity to visit Curry Up Now and Coupa Café to evaluate how their Bitcoin payment systems are operating.

As one of the early adopters of bitcoin as a form of payment, Coupa Café, a bustling hub for entrepreneurs and venture capitalists in downtown Palo Alto, was expected. Known for breaking new ground with emerging technologies, Jean-Paul Coupal, the café’s co-founder, has been considering Bitcoin payments since 2012. The primary challenge was streamlining the process of bitcoin transactions for the staff as well as patrons.

As a solution, they restructured their registers to show prices in both bitcoin and dollars, installed a smartphone with an app to monitor bitcoin deposits and put a QR code on display. Customers use this QR code for connecting to a payment portal and transferring the necessary quantity of bitcoins. Following the transfer, the app informs the cashier of its completion, thus finalizing the transaction.

To progress from dollar prices to bitcoin, the exchange rate’s manual input remains the sole element yet to be automated. Coupal personally updates this exchange rate every day. He has plans to expand the use of Bitcoin to another Coupa branch operating out of Stanford’s business school soon.

The system for Bitcoin transactions at Coupa includes an amusing feature – an alert is sent to Coupal’s phone each time a customer pays with bitcoin. The number of these alerts remains manageable as only a few customers prefer to pay using bitcoin every day.

In contrast to other bitcoin-accepting restaurants, Coupa keeps the received payments in bitcoins instead of immediately exchanging them for dollars. Being a firm believer in Bitcoin, Coupal has still not converted any Bitcoin payment the café has earned till now.

The promotion of Bitcoin as a payment option at Coupa is relatively low-key, with only a small sign at the counter and a discreet Bitcoin price shown on the register. Similarly, Curry Up, another nearby eatery, maintains a low-key presence when it comes to accepting Bitcoin, relying primarily on customers spreading word, according to Zachary Howard, a supervisor at Curry Up. This restaurant performs only a few Bitcoin transactions each week, having started accepting it a few months back. However, with Bitcoin’s newfound legal status, they may soon display a sign announcing this new payment option.

Minor enhancements were applied in 2025 for readability.