Walmart is finally giving in. Starting August 24, select Walmart and Sam’s Club stores will accept Apple Pay and other tap-to-pay methods, ending years of relying strictly on Walmart Pay.
The company plans to complete the rollout across all U.S. stores by the end of 2026, with gas stations following by mid-2027.
The move ends a long holdout that frustrated iPhone users accustomed to tapping to pay almost everywhere else.
Major chains including The Home Depot, Lowe’s, Kroger, and H-E-B had already added NFC-based payment support in recent years, leaving Walmart as one of the few prominent retailers still declining to support it.
Walmart had long pushed shoppers toward its own Walmart Pay system, which requires scanning a QR code at the register.
The new policy accepts Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Samsung Pay, and also extends tap-to-pay support to physical contactless credit and debit cards. Walmart Pay will continue to work alongside the new options.
What changes at checkout
With Apple Pay, shoppers can hold an iPhone or Apple Watch near the payment terminal to complete a transaction using a card stored in the Wallet app.
Apple Pay, which launched in 2014, does not transmit the actual card number during payment. Instead, it uses a device-specific token that keeps the underlying account details out of the transaction.
“We want customers and members to have choice in how they pay, so they can check out in the way that works best for them,” Walmart said in its announcement.
Late arrival in the U.S.
The U.S. acceptance is notably behind Walmart’s Canadian operations, which have supported Apple Pay since 2020. Whether tap-to-pay will extend to Walmart stores in Mexico has not been addressed.
The phased rollout means not every U.S. location will have the option immediately upon the program’s start on Monday.
Shoppers at stores that haven’t yet been upgraded will need to continue using Walmart Pay, a physical card, or cash until the terminal updates reach their location.
