Walmart And Amazon: How A New Seller Should Start

Walmart Marketplace and Amazon are two of the largest US marketplaces open to third-party sellers. New sellers often assume they have to pick one. They don't. Our recommendation is simple: start on Walmart, or start on Walmart and Amazon together, using one catalog, one inventory pool and one set of warehouses.

We run our own live Walmart store, shipping from warehouses in New Jersey and South Carolina, so we know Walmart's approval, listing and fulfillment rules firsthand. This guide explains why Walmart is where we recommend starting, how Amazon fits alongside it, and how the two compare on approval, competition, fees, fulfillment and advertising.

Why We Recommend Starting On Walmart

• Less crowded. Walmart has fewer sellers in most categories, so a well-run store with clean listings has a better chance of being seen.
• We know it firsthand. Approval, item setup, shipping templates, WFS and performance metrics are things we deal with every day.
• We handle the application with you. Walmart reviews sellers before they can list. We help you prepare the application and set up Seller Center properly once you're in.
• Good habits from day one. Walmart is strict about product data and delivery promises. A store built to that standard carries over cleanly to Amazon.

How Amazon Fits Alongside Walmart

Amazon works best added alongside Walmart rather than run as a separate business. The same product data, images, pricing logic and inventory can serve both marketplaces, and the same warehouses can ship orders for both.

• Launch together if your products, supply and budget are ready for two channels at once. We keep one inventory count across both so the same unit never sells twice.
• Add Amazon soon after if you'd rather get the Walmart store stable first. The catalog you built for Walmart becomes the starting point for your Amazon listings.

Either way, it's one operation, not two separate projects.

Getting Approved

Walmart Marketplace reviews sellers before they can list. Walmart generally looks for a registered US business, a tax ID, e-commerce or marketplace experience, a clear catalog and reliable fulfillment. The bar is higher than Amazon's, and that's part of why the marketplace is less crowded. Approval is Walmart's decision, but we handle the application with you: making sure your business details match your tax documents, your catalog and fulfillment plan are clear, and nothing is missing. Our guide to starting on Walmart Marketplace walks through the steps. Always check Walmart's current requirements before applying.

Amazon lets most sellers register and start listing after identity and business verification, without an up-front review of the business. Some categories, brands and products are gated, meaning Amazon needs extra approval, supplier invoices or brand authorization first.

On both, check gated or restricted categories before you buy inventory.

Competition

Amazon has far more sellers and a deeper catalog. In most categories you're up against established brands with long review histories, heavy advertisers and resellers on the same listings.

Walmart has fewer sellers in most categories, which is the main reason we recommend starting there. The tradeoff is less total traffic than Amazon for many product types, and a catalog that is strict about product data.

Both marketplaces award a Buy Box when several sellers offer the same item. Price, shipping speed, stock and seller performance all play a role. If you sell your own brand, Amazon has Brand Registry and Walmart has its own brand program. Check the current eligibility requirements for each.

How Fees Work

We don't quote fee percentages because they change and vary by category. Check current fees in Walmart Seller Center and Amazon Seller Central before building a pricing model. Conceptually:

Walmart

• Referral fees: a percentage of the total sale price, varying by category.
• WFS fees: if you use Walmart Fulfillment Services, per-unit fulfillment fees based on size and weight, plus storage fees.
• Walmart's structure is generally simpler to model, but read the current fee pages rather than assuming.

Amazon

• Selling plan: a per-item option or a monthly subscription. The subscription is needed for many seller tools.
• Referral fees: a percentage of the sale price, varying by category, sometimes with a per-item minimum.
• Fulfillment fees: if you use FBA, per-unit fees based on size and weight, plus storage fees.
• Other fees: things like long-term storage, returns processing or inventory placement can add cost.

Build each marketplace's price from your landed cost, that marketplace's fees, fulfillment, returns, advertising and target margin. The same product may need a different price on each.

Fulfillment: Seller-Fulfilled, WFS And FBA

Both marketplaces let you ship orders yourself or have the marketplace ship them.

Seller-fulfilled is common on Walmart, and it's how we ship most of our own Walmart orders. When you sell on both marketplaces, shipping from your own warehouse is often the simplest setup: one pool of stock serves Walmart and Amazon orders alike.

Walmart Fulfillment Services (WFS) stores your inventory in Walmart's network and handles shipping, customer service and returns for those orders. Eligible items can earn fast-shipping badges. See Walmart seller-fulfilled vs WFS for how we decide.

Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) does the same on Amazon, with Prime eligibility. It comes with prep and labeling rules, limits on how much you can send, and storage fees that rise if stock sits too long.

Inventory in WFS or FBA is committed to that network. When you run both marketplaces, plan inventory by location, not just in total, so one channel doesn't run dry while stock sits in the other's warehouse.

Advertising

Walmart Connect offers sponsored product ads and other formats. It's a smaller ecosystem, and competition for placements is often lower in many categories, another reason Walmart is a good place to start.

Amazon Ads is a mature platform with sponsored products, sponsored brands and display ads. In competitive categories, advertising is often needed for a new listing to be seen, and costs per click can be high.

On both, start with tight campaigns on your best listings, measure profit after ad spend rather than revenue, and cut what doesn't pay back.

Where TikTok Shop Fits

TikTok Shop is best treated as an add-on channel once your Walmart store (or Walmart and Amazon together) is running. Its sales are driven by content and creators and can spike suddenly, so it works best on top of an operation that already has inventory, listings and fulfillment under control. See what it takes to launch on TikTok Shop.

Common Mistakes

• Treating it as Walmart or Amazon instead of one operation that can serve both.
• Buying inventory before checking whether your products are gated or restricted.
• Copying one price across both marketplaces without modeling each fee structure.
• Sending most stock to WFS or FBA and starving the other channel.
• Measuring sales instead of profit after fees, fulfillment and ads.

If you want a team to get you approved on Walmart and run Walmart and Amazon together, see our Walmart Marketplace services and Amazon services, or start your store with us.