I've never even heard of Zelle until now, everyone I know has venmo installed.

You may have not heard of them, but their uptake is accelerating, and they are becoming the defacto US peer to peer funds transfer system.

"Zelle, U.S. banks’ answer to mobile payment services like PayPal and Venmo, claims that nearly 100,000 consumers, on average, are signing up for its service per day. The company also painted a picture of growing traction, noting it processed over 247 million payments in 2017, an increase of over 45 percent year-over-year, totalling $75 billion in peer-to-peer payments, up from $55 billion the year prior."

"Today, Zelle says there are more than 60 financial institutions on board, including 50 percent of U.S. demand deposit accounts, and it has expanded its partner ecosystem to include ACI Worldwide, CGI, D3 Banking Technology and IBM. They joined existing partners FIS, Fiserv, and Jack Henry & Associates."

"In PayPal’s third quarter 2017 earnings, the company reported that Venmo processed approximately $30 billion in payments over the past 12 months. Or, in other words, Zelle is now processing more than double the payment volume of Venmo."

https://techcrunch.com/2018/01/29/u-s-banks-venmo-alternativ...

It's being shoved down people's throats with a massive marketing push combined with Wells Fargo (and maybe other banks) disallowing you to transfer money to another wells fargo account (not owned by you) unless you use the app. Basically forcing you on the platform

I don't know much about Venmo vs. Zelle specifically, but a startup with marketing funded by VC money could easily beat a consortium of banks with little marketing. Zelle recently pivoted to a dedicated app, possibly because being buried inside bank apps wasn't very discoverable.

Venmo was that startup, acquired by PayPal, and now being trounced by said consortium.