Walmart Yields Just 0.88% — the Lowest of Any Dividend King, Because It's Priced Like Growth

The Lowest Yield of Any Dividend King Here

Walmart yields 0.88%. That is the lowest figure among every Dividend King in this curated set, barely a third of the group's 2.45% average. For a consumer-staples company, a retailer built on groceries and household basics, it is a strange place for the yield to sit. Staples usually pay more than this.

When a Staple Gets Priced Like a Growth Stock

The low yield is a valuation signal, not a dividend problem. Walmart's 0.88% sits 29% below its own five-year average of 1.23% and further still below its 10-year average of 1.66%. The yield has fallen for years because the share price has climbed faster than the dividend, as the market rerated Walmart from a sleepy retailer into a growth story built on e-commerce, advertising, and membership. To pull the yield back to its five-year norm on the current $0.95 payout, the price would have to drop from $112 toward $80. Our screen tags Walmart Overvalued.

Put plainly, Walmart now trades with the yield of a growth company, not the income profile of a staple. Buyers are paying for the expansion story, and the dividend has become a small detail inside it.

A Tiny Payout With a Long Record

The dividend itself is in no danger. Walmart pays out 34% of earnings, well under the 93% King average, and has raised the payout for 51 straight years. That is why the Safety Score reads a perfect 100.

A 34% payout leaves ample room to keep raising. Safety is never the question. The catch is that at 0.88%, those raises start from a very low base, so it takes many years of growth before the income becomes meaningful.

The Total-Return Question

A 0.88% yield reshapes where an investor's return has to come from. With income that small, almost all of the payoff must arrive through share-price gains and dividend growth, not the dividend itself. That is the profile of a growth stock, and it is a very different bet from a higher-yielding King whose 3% or 4% starting yield does real work every year. For Walmart to reward a buyer at today's price, the transformation story, e-commerce, advertising, membership, has to keep delivering. The 51-year streak guarantees the dividend will rise, but off a 0.88% base it will take many years of growth before that income becomes a meaningful part of the return. Here the dividend is a passenger, not the driver.

What Walmart's 0.88% Really Buys

So Walmart is a dividend name mostly in name. The 51-year streak and 34% payout are rock-solid, but the yield is the smallest of any King here because the market has priced the stock for growth. An income investor collects very little cash today. Buying Walmart is really buying the transformation story, with a safe but minor dividend along for the ride. The yield is less a reason to own it than a measure of how far the valuation has traveled.

Current price, yield history, and the ex-dividend schedule update daily on the Walmart (WMT) data page. The dividend record and latest figures are in the company's filings on SEC EDGAR. We explain the Safety Score's construction, a 0–50 streak score plus a 0–50 payout score, on our methodology page.

Disclaimer: This is informational only and not financial advice. Figures reflect the site snapshot dated 2026-07-06 and move with the market. Investing carries risk of loss, including loss of principal.