Side-by-side
| Dimension | Amazon | Walmart Marketplace |
|---|---|---|
| Buyer base | Largest of any marketplace covered in this hub | Large and growing, generally less saturated by sellers per category |
| Application | Self-serve, instant for most categories (category approval needed for some) | Application reviewed before approval — not instant |
| Referral fees | ~8-15%+, category-dependent | ~6-15%, category-dependent |
| Fulfillment program | FBA (mature, extensive network) | WFS (newer, smaller network, competitive pricing) |
| Monthly subscription | $39.99/mo for Professional plan | None — no setup, monthly, or hidden fees |
| Competition level | Highest — most sellers per category | Generally lower, though growing |
| Advertising platform | Amazon Ads (most mature) | Walmart Connect (newer, growing quickly) |
| Performance tracking | Account Health dashboard | Seller Scorecard |
| Brand tools | Brand Registry, A+ Content, Amazon Live | Walmart Brand Shop, enhanced content |
| International reach | Extensive (multiple country marketplaces, often unifiable) | More limited outside the U.S., though expanding (e.g., Walmart Canada/Mexico) |
How to decide
Start with Amazon if: you want access to the largest buyer base and are ready for the strictest operational bar (fast shipping, tight performance metrics) — most new sellers should validate here first specifically because of buyer volume.
Add Walmart second (or first, if you already have a strong catalog and reviews) if: you want a channel with typically less seller-to-seller competition per category, and you're prepared for Walmart's more thorough review-based application process rather than instant approval.
A common, low-risk sequencing: launch and prove the product on Amazon, then use that sales history, review count, and clean catalog data to strengthen your Walmart application — see the Amazon-to-Walmart learning path for the full sequence.
A worked example: the same product on both platforms
Take a $35 home-goods item. On Amazon, you might face a dozen or more established competitors in a similar niche, tight Buy Box competition, and a referral fee toward the higher end of the general range. On Walmart, the same product category might have a fraction of the seller density, meaning your listing's organic search ranking has an easier path to visibility even without heavy ad spend — but you first have to clear Walmart's application review, which can reject a thin or inconsistent catalog outright (see Marketplace Application Rejected).
The practical implication: Amazon often produces faster initial validation (more total searchers, faster feedback on whether the product sells at all), while Walmart can produce a better competitive position once you're in, precisely because fewer sellers have cleared its higher application bar.
What doesn't meaningfully differ
Both require legitimate business verification, both enforce real seller-performance standards, and both increasingly push sellers toward their fulfillment program (FBA/WFS) for competitive placement — this isn't a case where one platform is "easy" and the other "hard," so much as different competitive intensity and a different application gate.
Best practices when running both
- Keep a single source of truth for your catalog data (titles, images, attributes) and adapt formatting per platform rather than maintaining two independently drifting catalogs.
- Track account health/scorecard metrics separately — a clean Amazon account health status has no bearing on your Walmart Seller Scorecard, and vice versa.
- Watch for price-parity expectations — buyers and, on some platforms, policy can react to meaningfully different pricing for the identical item across Amazon and Walmart.
- Stagger your launch rather than going live on both simultaneously with a brand-new, unproven catalog — most sellers get better data quality feedback (and a smoother Walmart application) by launching Amazon first.
Common mistakes
- Assuming Walmart's lower average competition means lower effort — the application review bar and Seller Scorecard standards are real and can catch an unprepared seller off guard.
- Copy-pasting an Amazon listing verbatim into Walmart without adjusting for Walmart's specific attribute and image requirements, which can trigger listing errors or lower search visibility.
- Ignoring Walmart Connect (advertising) entirely because "Amazon Ads is more mature" — on a less-competitive marketplace, a modest ad budget can go further than the same budget would on Amazon.
FAQs
Which one should a brand-new seller start with? Amazon, for most general-merchandise sellers, purely because of buyer volume — it gives you the fastest, largest sample size to learn whether your product sells at all.
Can I use the same inventory pool for both Amazon FBA and Walmart WFS? No — FBA and WFS are separate fulfillment networks with separate inventory pools. You'll need to allocate stock (or maintain separate stock) across each; see Multichannel Inventory Allocation.
Does a strong Amazon account help my Walmart application? It can — sales history, review count, and a clean, well-structured catalog exported from Amazon experience are commonly cited as helpful context in a Walmart application, though Walmart evaluates its own application independently.