How to Sell on Walmart Marketplace in 2025: A Step-by-Step Guide for Amazon and Shopify Sellers

You have built real sales on Amazon or Shopify, and you keep hearing that Walmart Marketplace is where the smart sellers are diversifying. The traffic is huge, the competition is thinner than Amazon, and your dependence on a single platform’s fees and policies is a risk you would rather not carry. But the approval process has a reputation for being strict, and the platform works differently enough from Amazon that it is easy to get wrong. So you keep putting it off.

This is the step-by-step guide to selling on Walmart Marketplace in 2025, written specifically for sellers who already run Amazon or Shopify. You will get the approval requirements, how to launch, where Walmart differs from Amazon, and the fulfilment and advertising decisions that matter. The opportunity is real, and the barrier that puts off casual sellers is exactly what keeps the competition thin for the ones who commit.

Why Walmart Marketplace is worth the effort

Walmart Marketplace is the second-largest e-commerce marketplace in the United States, and that scale alone is the headline reason to be there. But for an established Amazon or Shopify seller, the specific case is stronger than just traffic.

The competition is genuinely lighter. Walmart’s approval process screens out the flood of casual sellers that crowd Amazon, so categories that are saturated on Amazon often have real room on Walmart. The fees are competitive, with no monthly subscription, just a referral fee per sale. And for a brand over-reliant on Amazon, Walmart is the most direct way to reduce platform risk: a second major marketplace means an Amazon suspension or fee change no longer threatens your whole business.

The insight for existing sellers: most of the hard work is already done. You have products that sell, listings you can adapt, and fulfilment you already run. Walmart is not a new business, it is a new channel for the business you have. The brands that hesitate treat it as starting over. The ones that win treat it as plugging proven products into a new, less crowded surface.

Step one: meet the approval requirements

Walmart vets sellers before they can list, which is why preparation matters. Have these ready before you apply.

A registered business with the relevant tax identification. Walmart is stricter than Amazon here, so make sure your business details are clean and consistent.
A track record of e-commerce success. Walmart wants sellers who can deliver. Your Amazon or Shopify history works in your favour, so be ready to demonstrate it.
A plan for competitive pricing. Walmart’s culture is built on low prices, and the platform actively monitors whether your price is competitive against the same product elsewhere. Going in with a pricing strategy is not optional.
A fulfilment method that meets Walmart’s delivery standards. Fast, reliable shipping is a requirement, not a nice-to-have, and your fulfilment plan is part of being approved and staying in good standing.

Getting the application right the first time matters, because a rejection means delay. We handle Walmart onboarding as part of full multi-channel account management, so the application clears and the launch is clean.

Step two: launch your listings the right way

Once approved, resist the temptation to dump your Amazon listings across unchanged. Walmart’s catalogue and search work differently, and a careless migration converts poorly.

Adapt, do not copy

You can use your Amazon content as a starting point, but adapt it. Walmart’s search algorithm and shopper expectations differ, so titles, key features, and descriptions should be tuned for Walmart rather than pasted from Amazon. Match Walmart’s content guidelines and category structure rather than fighting them.

Get the catalogue data right

Walmart leans heavily on structured product data: correct categories, complete attributes, accurate identifiers. Listings with thin or wrong data simply do not surface. Spend the time on clean, complete product information, because on Walmart it is a ranking factor as much as a compliance one.

Price to win the buy box

Walmart’s buy box is even more price-driven than Amazon’s. The platform rewards competitive pricing directly with visibility, so your pricing strategy and your visibility are tightly linked. This is the single biggest mindset shift for an Amazon seller, where price is one factor among many. On Walmart, it leads.

Step three: choose your fulfilment model

Fulfilment decides your delivery performance, which decides your visibility and your standing. You have two main routes.

Walmart Fulfilment Services is Walmart’s equivalent of FBA. You send inventory to Walmart, they pick, pack, and ship, and your items get the fast-delivery treatment that lifts conversion and ranking. It is the simplest way to meet delivery standards and the closest experience to selling on Amazon with FBA.

Seller fulfilled means you ship orders yourself or through your own third-party logistics provider. This gives you control and can cost less at volume, but you are responsible for hitting Walmart’s delivery speed and reliability targets, and falling short hurts your account health.

For most Amazon sellers, Walmart Fulfilment Services is the easiest way to launch well, because it removes the delivery-performance risk while you learn the channel. You can always move to seller fulfilled later once you understand the economics.

Step four: turn on Walmart advertising

Walmart Connect, the platform’s advertising system, works on familiar territory for an Amazon PPC seller, and it is currently less competitive, which means lower costs for the sellers who get in early.

Start with sponsored products targeting your highest-converting items, structure campaigns the way you would a well-run Amazon account, separating discovery from proven winners, and apply the same negative-keyword discipline. The fundamentals of paid marketplace advertising carry straight over from Amazon. The advantage is that fewer sellers are competing, so the same disciplined approach that produces results on Amazon often produces them more cheaply on Walmart. Folding this into your structure is part of how we run Amazon growth and PPC, since the same operators run both.

Common mistake

Treating Walmart as a copy of Amazon. The platforms rhyme, but they are not the same. Sellers who paste Amazon listings across, ignore Walmart’s price-driven buy box, and fail to meet delivery standards conclude that “Walmart does not work” when the real issue is that they ran an Amazon playbook on a different platform. Respect Walmart’s differences, especially on price and data, and the channel performs.

Walmart versus Amazon: the differences that catch sellers out

If you are coming from Amazon, these are the gaps that trip people up most. Knowing them upfront is the difference between a smooth launch and a frustrating one.

Price is the dominant lever. Amazon’s buy box weighs price alongside fulfilment, ratings, and account health. Walmart’s is far more price-led, and the platform actively compares your price to the same product elsewhere on the web. A price that wins on Amazon can lose visibility on Walmart. Build your pricing strategy around this from day one.

Catalogue data carries more weight. Walmart relies heavily on structured attributes and correct categorisation to surface products. Thin data that scrapes by on Amazon will leave you invisible on Walmart. Complete, accurate product information is a ranking factor, not just admin.

The competition is thinner, so discipline pays more. Because fewer sellers clear approval and run their accounts properly, the same structured approach that is merely competitive on Amazon can be a genuine advantage on Walmart. The basics, done well, go further here.

Delivery standards are strict and enforced. Walmart cares intensely about delivery speed and reliability, and falling short directly damages your visibility and standing. This is why Walmart Fulfilment Services is the safer launch route for most sellers.

Reviews start from zero. Your Amazon reviews do not transfer. Plan for a period of building social proof on Walmart, and lean on competitive pricing and complete listings to convert while your review count grows.

None of these are reasons to avoid Walmart. They are reasons to launch deliberately rather than by copy and paste. Respect the differences and the thinner competition works in your favour.

What to do next

To launch on Walmart Marketplace as an existing seller:

Prepare your business documents, e-commerce track record, pricing plan, and fulfilment method before you apply.
Adapt your listings for Walmart rather than copying them from Amazon.
Get your catalogue data clean and complete, because it drives visibility.
Choose Walmart Fulfilment Services to meet delivery standards while you learn the channel.
Run Walmart Connect with the same discipline you apply to Amazon PPC, while costs are still low.

Walmart is the most direct way for an Amazon or Shopify brand to diversify and reduce platform risk, and the approval barrier that scares off casual sellers is exactly what keeps it worth doing. You already have the products. This is just a new, less crowded place to sell them.

Start with a free audit. We will tell you exactly what is holding your brand back and what a 90-day plan to fix it looks like for your specific channels. You can book yours here.