First-party retail media benchmarks

Walmart Connect Benchmarks: CPC, CTR and ROAS

RMIQ-managed Walmart Connect campaigns paid $0.48 a click, the cheapest click of the five retail media networks in our data and 47% below Amazon Ads at $0.90. They still returned 4.57x ROAS, within 1% of Amazon's 4.61x.

Walmart Connect is Walmart's retail media network, where brands buy Sponsored Search ads on Walmart.com and the Walmart app. This page publishes what those ads cost and return in RMIQ's accounts: cost per click (CPC), click-through rate (CTR) and return on ad spend (ROAS), set against Amazon Ads, Instacart, Sprouts and Thrive Market over the same month. The figures are RMIQ's own averages from live client campaigns. Nothing here is gated, and no email is required.

Written by Mateusz Drela, CEO, RMIQReviewed November 2026

The dataset

Walmart Connect benchmarks at a glance

RMIQ-managed Walmart Connect campaigns, September 2026. Ratio metrics only; spend and sales stay client-confidential.
Metric	Benchmark	What it covers
Average CPC	$0.48	Cost per click, all managed Walmart Connect campaigns
Average CTR	0.37%	Clicks divided by impressions, all managed campaigns
ROAS	4.57x	Attributed sales per $1 of ad spend
Clicks per $1,000	About 2,080	At the average CPC, against about 1,110 on Amazon Ads
Scale	1M+	Ad impressions in the period

Cost per click

How much does Walmart Connect cost per click?

The average Walmart Connect CPC across RMIQ-managed campaigns was $0.48, the lowest of the five networks we measured and 47% below the $0.90 average on Amazon Ads in the same month. At those averages, $1,000 buys about 2,080 clicks on Walmart and about 1,110 on Amazon, nearly 1.9 times as many.

Sponsored Products are sold per click in a second-price auction: you set a maximum bid and pay only what it takes to win, and Walmart weighs each product's relevance alongside the bid. Four things move your CPC around the average:

Who else is bidding. Walmart's clicks have cost less than Amazon's for years: Pacvue's Q4 2022 data put Walmart at $0.65 a click against $1.21 for Amazon Sponsored Products. In RMIQ's accounts, fewer brands run always-on Walmart programs, which keeps the clearing price down.
Your category. In RMIQ's accounts, household staples and beverages carry the most competition, while better-for-you and specialty categories clear well under $0.48.
Automatic or manual targeting. Walmart recommends automatic targeting as the simplest way to start, and many advertisers do. In RMIQ's accounts, automatic campaigns win cheaper clicks, and manual keyword campaigns pay more per click and convert better.
The season. Q4 lifts the whole auction: in Q4 2022, Walmart's average CPC rose 16% on the previous quarter. Plan bids for the holiday peak before it starts.

The low price is also a window. Marketplace sellers grew their Walmart advertising spend by more than 50% in Walmart's first quarter of fiscal 2027, and Walmart Connect grew 43% (excluding VIZIO) in the second. More bidders push clearing prices up, so brands that build their Walmart programs now buy in at today's prices.

A quick check from RMIQ's playbook: if your CPC sits below $0.48 and your CTR also sits below 0.37%, the campaign is probably buying cheap impressions in placements that do not fit the product.

Click-through rate

What CTR should you expect on Walmart Sponsored Products?

Walmart Connect delivered a 0.37% click-through rate in RMIQ-managed campaigns, the lowest of the five networks: about half of Amazon's 0.70% and under a fifth of Instacart's 2.11%. It is the other side of the cheap click.

Out of every 1,000 impressions, about 3.7 turned into clicks on Walmart and about 7 on Amazon. Because you pay only for the click, the low CTR makes Walmart the cheapest reach in our data too. Its implied cost per thousand impressions (CPC times clicks per thousand impressions) works out to $1.78, against $6.30 on Amazon, so a dollar buys about 3.5 times the impressions. The figure is implied: Sponsored Products are sold per click, and Walmart charges nothing for an impression that is not clicked.

RMIQ-managed campaigns on each network, September 2026.
Network	Average CPC	Average CTR
Walmart Connect	$0.48	0.37%
Amazon Ads	$0.90	0.70%

Wide placement inventory. Sponsored Products appear across search, browse and item pages on the Walmart site and app, in grids, carousels, the Buy Box and Stock Up. In RMIQ's reading, many of those placements reach shoppers who are browsing, so each one draws fewer clicks.
Mixed shopper intent. In RMIQ's view, a Walmart.com session spans general merchandise, grocery pickup and price checking, so intent at the moment of an impression is less concentrated than on a grocery-basket network.
Automatic campaign spread. Automatic campaigns can serve in eight placements, against four at most for manual ones. In RMIQ's accounts, budgets heavy on automatic campaigns pull blended CTR down.

Relevance is the lever RMIQ pulls first on CTR. Walmart picks auction winners on relevance and bid together, and it advises advertising best sellers with high-quality listings. Tight keyword structure does the rest, and our Walmart keyword research tool is a good place to start the list.

Return on ad spend

What ROAS should you expect on Walmart Connect?

RMIQ-managed Walmart Connect campaigns returned 4.57x ROAS, within 1% of Amazon Ads at 4.61x and 29% above Sprouts at 3.53x. Walmart got there with clicks that cost 47% less.

Each Walmart click carried less in attributed sales: $2.19, against $4.15 for an Amazon click. The cheaper click makes up the difference, so a dollar spent on Walmart earned almost exactly what a dollar spent on Amazon earned.

Clicks at each network's average CPC and attributed sales at its ROAS, RMIQ-managed campaigns, September 2026. Budgets are examples.
Monthly budget	Walmart Connect clicks	Amazon Ads clicks	Walmart attributed sales	Amazon attributed sales
$1,000	2,083	1,111	$4,570	$4,610
$10,000	20,833	11,111	$45,700	$46,100

Try it with your own monthly ad spend

Monthly ad spend $1,500

Instacart, 7.95x$11,925

Thrive Market, 4.64x$6,960

Amazon Ads, 4.61x$6,915

Walmart Connect, 4.57x$6,855

Sprouts, 3.53x$5,295

Attributed sales at each network's average ROAS in this dataset, applied to your number. Your own ROAS will differ.

What holds Walmart ROAS back

Best sellers sitting out. An ad serves only while the item is published, in stock and winning the Buy Box. When a best seller goes out of stock or loses the Buy Box, it drops out of the auction and the campaign keeps running on weaker items. Walmart added item-level alerts in June 2026, because until then there was no programmatic way to detect it.
Search terms nobody has pruned. Negative keywords arrived for Sponsored Products in July 2026, on manual campaigns and on automatic campaigns with fixed bidding. Dynamic and Target ROAS campaigns still cannot use them. In RMIQ's accounts, automatic campaigns running without negatives are a common drag on ROAS.
Automatic campaigns left on autopilot. In RMIQ's accounts, budgets that run mostly on automatic campaigns show the low CTR on this page without the return.

See how RMIQ runs Walmart Connect

Walmart-specific

How Walmart Sponsored Search placements shape these numbers

On Walmart, campaign type decides where your ads can appear, and placement decides much of your CTR and CPC. Walmart gives manual and automatic campaigns different placement sets and different controls.

Manual (keyword) campaigns. These serve in Search In-grid by default. Search Carousel, Item Buybox and Item Carousel stay off on every manual campaign until you switch them on, so a manual campaign starts with the tightest placement set Walmart offers.
Automatic campaigns. Walmart picks the keywords from your product titles, descriptions, category and related products, and serves across search, browse, carousels, the Buy Box, the home page and Stock Up. New automatic campaigns are also opted in to Brand Term Targeting by default.
Bid multipliers. Automatic and manual campaigns can raise bids by placement, such as the Buy Box or Search In-grid, so you pay more where a placement converts.
Negative keywords. Available since July 2026 on manual campaigns and fixed-bid automatic campaigns, as negative exact and negative phrase match.

The two work best as a pair. Walmart's automatic targeting tests search terms to find what works. In RMIQ's accounts, manual keyword campaigns pay more per click and convert better, so the practical move is to give the terms that convert their own manual campaigns and bids, and switch on carousels and the Buy Box only where they pay. For formats beyond Sponsored Products, see the Walmart Connect ads guide.

Network comparison

Walmart Connect vs Amazon Ads: CPC, CTR and ROAS

Walmart Connect delivered a 47% lower CPC than Amazon Ads at about half the CTR, and the two landed within 1% of each other on ROAS (4.57x and 4.61x). Amazon's clicks cost more and happen more often; Walmart's cost less and happen less often. The return per dollar comes out level.

RMIQ-managed campaigns on each network, September 2026. CTR is clicks divided by impressions.
Network	Average CPC	Average CTR	ROAS
Instacart	$0.53	2.11%	7.95x
Amazon Ads	$0.90	0.70%	4.61x
Walmart Connect	$0.48	0.37%	4.57x
Sprouts	$0.79	1.67%	3.53x
Thrive Market	$0.79	3.16%	4.64x

Across all five, Instacart leads on ROAS at 7.95x, Thrive Market on CTR at 3.16%, and Walmart on price per click. See the Instacart Ads benchmarks for the grocery side of the table.

For consumer packaged goods (CPG) brands with strong Walmart store distribution, Walmart Connect earns a full line in the media plan. The same budget buys nearly twice the clicks and about 3.5 times the impressions of Amazon at almost the same return.

Benchmark your account across networks

Methodology

How these benchmarks were measured

Source:: Walmart Connect campaigns RMIQ manages for CPG brands
Scale:: 1M+ ad impressions
Period:: September 2026
CPC and CTR:: All managed Walmart Connect campaigns in the period; CTR is clicks divided by impressions
ROAS:: Attributed sales divided by ad spend, as each network reports it
Not published:: Spend and sales in absolute terms

The same month and the same method cover all five networks, so the comparison table reads straight across. ROAS is taken from each network's own reporting. Walmart Sponsored Search credits sales to the last ad click within a 3, 14 or 30-day window; Amazon Sponsored Products uses 7 days for seller accounts and 14 for vendors.

These are RMIQ client averages. Walmart Connect platform averages and published industry benchmarks blend every category and campaign setup. Results vary by category, basket size, promotional calendar and competitive density.

The numbers on this page may be quoted with a link to this page as the source. For the wider market, see the retail media guide.

FAQ

Walmart Connect benchmarks: questions

How much does Walmart Connect cost?

Sponsored Products are pay per click, and RMIQ-managed campaigns averaged $0.48 a click. A campaign needs a total budget of at least $100 for suppliers (1P) or $50 for marketplace sellers (3P), and a daily budget of at least $50 or $10. Walmart recommends at least $100 a day on Dynamic Bidding.

Is Walmart Connect cheaper than Amazon Ads?

Per click, yes. RMIQ-managed campaigns paid $0.48 on Walmart Connect and $0.90 on Amazon Ads, 47% less. ROAS came out almost level, at 4.57x on Walmart and 4.61x on Amazon, so Walmart delivered almost the same return per dollar through clicks that cost about half as much.

What ROAS should I expect on Walmart Connect?

RMIQ-managed Walmart Connect campaigns returned 4.57x ROAS, within 1% of Amazon Ads and above Sprouts at 3.53x. In RMIQ's accounts, those that fall short usually have best sellers out of stock or off the Buy Box, unpruned search terms, or too much budget on automatic campaigns.

What CTR should I expect on Walmart Sponsored Products?

RMIQ-managed campaigns averaged a 0.37% click-through rate, about 3.7 clicks per 1,000 impressions. That is the lowest of the five networks we measured and about half of Amazon's 0.70%. Walmart's wide placement inventory explains much of it, and in RMIQ's accounts keyword relevance is the main lever for lifting it.

How should I split budget between Amazon and Walmart Connect?

At RMIQ's averages, $1,000 bought about 2,080 clicks and $4,570 in attributed sales on Walmart Connect, and about 1,110 clicks and $4,610 on Amazon Ads. With returns this close, fund Walmart in line with how much of your sales Walmart carries, and grow it while clicks stay cheap.

How do Walmart Connect attribution windows compare with Amazon's?

Walmart Sponsored Search credits the last ad click within a 3, 14 or 30-day window, and its default ROAS counts online sales only, with an omni ROAS metric alongside. Amazon Sponsored Products credits the last click within 7 days for sellers and 14 days for vendors.

Sources

RMIQ, campaign data from RMIQ-managed accounts on five retail media networks, September 2026.
RMIQ, Walmart Connect benchmarks page brief, November 2026: RMIQ's observations on its accounts.
Walmart Marketplace Learn, Sponsored Search: cost per click, second-price auction, ad eligibility.
Walmart Connect, Sponsored Products; Easy campaign set up.
Walmart Connect, Introducing negative keywords for Sponsored Products, July 29, 2026.
Walmart Connect Advertising Help: glossary; attribution.
Walmart Sponsored Search API documentation: create campaign, applicable placements, placement include and exclude, bid multipliers, negative keywords, product release notes (June 2026 item alerts).
Walmart Inc., second quarter fiscal 2027 earnings release; first quarter fiscal 2027 earnings call.
MediaPost, Cost-Per-Click Falls On Amazon, Jumps On Walmart And Instacart, January 18, 2023 (Pacvue Q4 2022 data).
Amazon Sponsored Products attribution windows: Intentwise.
RMIQ, Walmart Connect ads guide.