How to Sell on Walmart Marketplace

Why sell on Walmart Marketplace?

Walmart.com gets over 120 million unique visitors per month. That's a massive audience, and the marketplace is still relatively uncrowded compared to Amazon. While Amazon has over 2 million active third-party sellers, Walmart Marketplace has roughly 150,000. That means less competition for every product category.

Walmart actively recruits quality sellers. They want to grow their marketplace to compete with Amazon, and they're investing heavily in seller tools, advertising, and fulfillment infrastructure. For sellers already selling on Amazon or Shopify, Walmart is one of the most logical next steps.

Walmart Marketplace vs Amazon

The biggest advantage? No monthly subscription fee. Amazon charges $39.99/month just to maintain a professional seller account. Walmart charges nothing. You only pay when you make a sale. For sellers testing a new channel, that eliminates a lot of risk.

Walmart shoppers also tend to be value-conscious and brand-loyal. If your products are competitively priced and well-reviewed, you can build a loyal customer base faster than on Amazon, where price wars are constant.

Requirements and application process

Unlike Amazon, where anyone can create a seller account in minutes, Walmart Marketplace has an application process. They review every applicant before granting access. This is actually a good thing for sellers who get approved, because it keeps the marketplace quality high and reduces the race-to-the-bottom competition.

What Walmart looks for in applicants

• US business tax ID (EIN or SSN). You need a US-based business entity. International sellers can apply through Walmart's cross-border program.
• E-commerce track record. Walmart prefers sellers who already sell online, whether on Amazon, Shopify, eBay, or another platform. They want to see that you can handle fulfillment and customer service.
• Product catalog. They review what you plan to sell. Walmart has category restrictions and prohibited items lists.
• Competitive pricing. Walmart is known for low prices. If your products are significantly more expensive than competitors, that can affect your application.
• Fulfillment capabilities. They want confidence you can ship on time and handle returns professionally.

How to apply step by step

Walmart Marketplace fees explained

Walmart's fee structure is simpler than Amazon's, and the total cost is often lower. Here's what you'll pay:

Referral fees (the only mandatory fee)

Walmart charges a referral fee on each sale, calculated as a percentage of the total sale price (including shipping). The rate varies by category:

These rates are comparable to Amazon's referral fees, but remember: there is no monthly subscription fee. On Amazon, you pay $39.99/month before you sell a single item. On Walmart, you pay nothing until you make a sale.

WFS fees (optional)

If you use Walmart Fulfillment Services (more on this below), you'll pay fulfillment fees based on the weight and size of your products. These are similar to Amazon FBA fees and cover storage, picking, packing, and shipping.

Advertising fees (optional)

Walmart Connect (their advertising platform) charges on a cost-per-click basis. Advertising is optional but increasingly important for visibility. CPC rates on Walmart are generally lower than Amazon because there's less competition for keywords.

Fulfillment options: WFS vs self-ship

Walmart gives you two main fulfillment options. Your choice affects your costs, your buy box eligibility, and how much work you handle yourself.

Walmart Fulfillment Services (WFS)

WFS is Walmart's answer to Amazon FBA. You ship your products to Walmart's fulfillment centers, and they handle storage, picking, packing, shipping, and customer service for those orders.

Seller-fulfilled (self-ship)

You store and ship products yourself (or through your own 3PL). You maintain full control over the fulfillment experience but miss out on the two-day shipping badge and some buy box advantages.

Best approach for most sellers: Start with seller-fulfilled to test demand and validate your product-market fit on Walmart. Once you identify your best sellers, move those products to WFS for the visibility boost. Keep slower-moving inventory self-fulfilled to avoid WFS storage fees.

If you're already using Amazon FBA and want to fulfill Walmart orders from the same inventory, consider using Amazon's Multi-Channel Fulfillment (MCF) to ship Walmart orders from your FBA inventory. This keeps your inventory in one place while selling on both platforms.

Listing products and optimizing for Walmart search

Getting your products listed on Walmart is just the beginning. Optimizing your listings for Walmart's search algorithm determines whether shoppers actually find them.

Product listing requirements

Every Walmart listing needs:

• Product name (up to 200 characters). Include the brand, key features, size/quantity, and color. Follow Walmart's title format guidelines.
• Product description (up to 4,000 characters). Detailed, benefit-focused copy. Use bullet points for scannability.
• Key features (3-10 bullet points). These appear prominently on the product page and heavily influence purchase decisions.
• Images (at least 2, ideally 5+). High-resolution, white background for main image. Lifestyle images for secondary shots.
• Product identifiers (UPC/GTIN). Walmart requires UPC codes for most products.
• Category and attributes. Choose the most specific category and fill out all relevant product attributes.

Walmart SEO tips

Walmart's search algorithm is different from Amazon's. Here's what matters most:

1. Use relevant keywords naturally. Walmart's algorithm reads your title, description, and key features. Include the terms shoppers search for, but don't keyword-stuff.
2. Price competitively. Walmart's algorithm favors competitively priced products. If your price is significantly above competitors for the same product, your ranking will suffer.
3. Maintain high in-stock rates. Out-of-stock products lose ranking quickly. This is where inventory management across channels becomes critical.
4. Earn reviews. Product reviews influence both ranking and conversion. Use Walmart's Review Accelerator program to get early reviews on new products.
5. Fill out every attribute. The more product attributes you complete, the better Walmart can match your product to relevant searches. Don't skip optional fields.

The buy box on Walmart

Like Amazon, Walmart has a buy box. When multiple sellers offer the same product (matched by UPC), only one seller wins the buy box at a time. Factors that influence buy box placement include price, shipping speed (WFS sellers have an advantage), seller rating, and in-stock history.

If you sell private label or unique products, you won't compete for the buy box. You'll own it by default. This is another reason private label sellers tend to do well on Walmart.

Managing Walmart alongside your other channels

Most sellers who join Walmart Marketplace are already selling on at least one other platform. The challenge is managing everything together without the operational overhead eating into your margins.

Inventory sync is non-negotiable

When you sell on Walmart, Amazon, Shopify, and potentially Etsy or eBay, you have the same inventory listed in multiple places. A sale on one platform needs to reduce available stock on all others within seconds. Manual updates don't scale. Even with just two platforms, it's easy to oversell and cancel orders.

On Walmart specifically, canceled orders due to out-of-stock issues hurt your seller scorecard. A poor scorecard leads to reduced visibility, lost buy box placement, and in severe cases, account suspension. Keeping your inventory accurate isn't just good practice. It's required for long-term success.

Order management

Walmart orders come through Seller Center. Amazon orders come through Seller Central. Shopify orders come through your Shopify admin. Switching between three dashboards to manage orders, print labels, and track shipments is a productivity killer.

A multichannel management tool pulls all your orders into one place. You see every order from every channel, print shipping labels in batch, and update tracking numbers across all platforms automatically.

Pricing strategy

Walmart has a price parity policy. If your product is listed significantly cheaper on your own website or another marketplace, Walmart may suppress your listing. This means you need to keep pricing consistent across channels, or at least ensure your Walmart pricing is competitive.

This doesn't mean every price has to be identical. Small variations are fine. But if you're running a deep discount on Shopify and charging full price on Walmart, expect your Walmart listing to lose visibility.

Expanding from here

If you're successfully selling on Walmart and one or two other platforms, you already have the infrastructure to scale further. Adding another channel (like eBay or Etsy) becomes straightforward when your inventory management is centralized. The same processes and tools that manage Walmart and Shopify can handle additional platforms with minimal extra work.

Frequently asked questions

Ready to expand your multichannel operation? Learn how to manage inventory across multiple stores or read about expanding from Shopify to Amazon.