Walmart Dropshipping Guide: How to Dropship on Walmart

Dropshipping on Walmart through Walmart Marketplace lets you list and sell products on the retailer’s website with an approved seller account while a dedicated dropshipping supplier handles inventory storage and order fulfillment.

According to Statista, Walmart was the second-largest ecommerce retailer in the US, after Amazon, in 2025, with a 9.2% share of the retail ecommerce market. The retailer says it has more than 100 million monthly unique visitors to Walmart.com. Walmart dropshipping lets you reach this established customer base without purchasing or warehousing inventory in advance.

Learn how dropshipping on Walmart works, how to meet seller standards, and how to connect Walmart Marketplace directly to your Shopify store.

What is Walmart dropshipping?

Walmart dropshipping is an ecommerce business model where an approved third-party seller lists items on Walmart.com through Walmart Marketplace and routes customer orders to a dropshipping supplier for delivery. The supplier packages each item and ships it straight to the customer’s address. That way, you, the seller, don’t need to lease warehouse space or purchase inventory upfront.

Although there are no setup fees or monthly Walmart dropshipping fees, Walmart deducts a referral fee from each completed Walmart Marketplace sale. Rates vary by product category and sales price. Sellers receive payouts from Walmart every two weeks, although new Walmart Marketplace sellers may be subject to a payment hold for an initial period.

What Walmart dropshipping is not

Walmart dropshipping shouldn’t be confused with using Walmart itself as a dropshipping supplier, which Walmart restricts under its terms of use. For example, you can’t purchase products from Walmart.com to fulfill orders placed through another sales channel, such as eBay or Facebook Marketplace. Likewise, you can’t list dropship products through Walmart Marketplace and fulfill those orders from other retailers, such as Amazon or Target. 

Dropshipping through Walmart Marketplace also differs from Walmart Fulfillment Services (WFS), Walmart’s third-party logistics (3PL) program. With WFS, your online business purchases inventory in advance and ships it to a Walmart fulfillment center, where warehouse teams manage storage and order dispatch. Because you own the inventory being stored and fulfilled, WFS is not dropshipping.

How to start Walmart dropshipping

1. Prepare your business and product information
2. Choose a Walmart-compliant dropshipping supplier
3. Apply to Walmart Marketplace
4. Configure payouts, shipping, and returns
5. Connect Walmart to your online store
6. Create and publish your Walmart listings

To start dropshipping on Walmart, you’ll need to meet Walmart Marketplace’s seller and product requirements, establish a compliant fulfillment process, and set up your products for sale. 

Here’s a step-by-step guide to getting started with Walmart dropshipping: 

1. Prepare your business and product information

Before applying to Walmart Marketplace, make sure your business meets its minimum seller qualifications. Walmart requires a personal ID, a business tax ID or business license number, a business entity classification, and supporting documents for verification. Walmart does not accept Social Security numbers as business tax IDs. 

If your business needs an employer identification number (EIN), you can apply for one through the Internal Revenue Service.

You’ll also need demonstrated marketplace or ecommerce success, eligible products with the required product identifiers, a product catalog that adheres to Walmart’s Prohibited Products Policy, and a qualifying fulfillment process. 

2. Choose a Walmart-compliant dropshipping supplier

Choose a dropshipping supplier that can meet Walmart’s shipping and fulfillment requirements. Your supplier can’t ship orders in competitor-branded packaging or include third-party promotional materials, and any multichannel fulfillment provider must use neutral packaging. 

Confirm that your supplier can ship orders within Walmart’s required window (generally two operational days) and provide accurate, valid carrier tracking. While evaluating potential partners against Walmart’s standards, research reliable suppliers that meet your own standards as well. Before listing products, order physical product samples to inspect product quality and packaging.

3. Apply to Walmart Marketplace

Visit the Walmart Marketplace portal and apply for your Walmart Marketplace seller account. Walmart considers your history of marketplace or ecommerce success as part of its seller qualifications. When completing your application, verify that your company name and federal tax details match your official business and tax records.

Once approved, you’ll use Walmart Seller Center to set up and manage your Marketplace account, including your catalog, orders, payments, shipping settings, and seller performance.

4. Configure payouts, shipping, and returns

In Walmart Seller Center, choose an available payout method and connect it to your Walmart Marketplace account. Payout provider options vary depending on your country, and new sellers may be subject to a rolling delay of payment.

Next, configure your shipping and returns settings in accordance with Walmart Marketplace policies and your supplier’s capabilities. Choose shipping methods, speeds, and regions that reflect what your dropshipping supplier can reliably deliver so that your promised delivery dates align with actual fulfillment times.

For returns, you must maintain at least one valid US return center address in Seller Center and generally offer a minimum 30-day return window. Confirm that your dropshipping supplier can support these requirements. 

5. Connect Walmart to your online store

Once you’ve completed the required Walmart seller account setup, you can connect it to your Shopify store. Install Shopify Marketplace Connect from the Shopify App Store to connect Walmart to Shopify and manage product listings, orders, and inventory from your Shopify dashboard. 

The first 50 marketplace-synced orders each month are free to process. After that, Marketplace Connect charges a 1% fee per additional synced order, capped at $99 per month.

6. Create and publish your Walmart listings

With your accounts connected, use Marketplace Connect to add products from your Shopify catalog to Walmart Marketplace. Your existing Shopify product information—titles, descriptions, images, and pricing—forms the basis of your Walmart listings, and you can adjust details for Walmart as needed before publishing. 

Walmart requires products to have a valid Global Trade Item Number (GTIN), or other applicable product identifier, such as a Universal Product Code (UPC), European Article Number (EAN), or International Standard Book Number (ISBN). If an eligible product doesn’t have a product identifier, you can request an exemption via Walmart Seller Center.

Tips for successful Walmart dropshipping

• Maintain strong seller performance
• Synchronize inventory to prevent stockouts
• Create complete listings to improve discoverability

To build a successful Walmart dropshipping business, focus on maintaining Walmart’s seller performance standards, keeping inventory accurate across sales channels, and optimizing your listings to help customers find and evaluate your products.

Maintain strong seller performance

Walmart regularly evaluates seller performance across key metrics. Once your Walmart dropshipping store is up and running, monitor your Performance dashboard in Seller Center to make sure you meet the following Seller Performance Standards:

• Cancellation rate: 2% or below

• On-time delivery rate: 90% or above

• Valid tracking rate: 99% or above

• Seller response rate: 95% or above

• Negative feedback rate: 2% or below

• Return rate: 6% or below (9% or below for resold inventory)

• Item not received rate: 2% or below 

• Late shipment rate: 5% or below

Because your dropshipping supplier handles fulfillment, monitor its performance closely as well. Failure to meet Walmart’s Seller Performance Standards and improve your performance may result in account suppression, suspension, or termination.

Synchronize inventory to prevent stockouts

If a product is out of stock at your supplier but remains active on Walmart, you may have to cancel customer orders, which can hurt your seller performance. Keep supplier inventory synchronized with your Shopify store, and use Shopify Marketplace Connect to keep inventory updated across your Shopify store and Walmart listings. 

Create complete listings to improve discoverability

Create comprehensive Walmart listings to improve product visibility and give shoppers the information they need to make a purchase. Choose the correct product category, ensure you have clear and descriptive titles and product descriptions, highlight key product features, and complete relevant product attributes. Walmart also recommends uploading four professional, high-resolution product images. 

These elements contribute to your Walmart listing quality. The retailer says polished item page content can improve product discoverability in search and browse results, while high-quality content can help customers evaluate products more confidently and reduce returns.