Walmart is scaling drone delivery across 150 more stores over the next year, which would expand the technology to an anticipated 270 locations by 2027.
The retail giant is expanding its partnership with drone operator Wing to cover the ground, building on what it calls successful operations in the Dallas-Fort Worth and Atlanta metropolitan areas.
Walmart anticipates the expansion will enable more than 40 million Americans to access drone delivery, up from the estimated 2 million shoppers currently served by the technology.
Related Stories
Deployments of the technology are expected in Walmart stores across Los Angeles, St. Louis, Cincinnati and Miami, with others to be announced later, Wing said in a statement.
Last year, the partnership between Walmart and Wing expanded to additional markets including Charlotte, N.C., Orlando, Fla. and Tampa, Fla., with operations in Houston locations starting Thursday.
Walmart first partnered with Wing in August 2023, when the on-demand drone delivery technology was deployed in a Walmart Supercenter in Frisco, Texas. The program later grew to 18 Walmart Supercenters in Dallas-Fort Worth and more recently spread to the Atlanta stores.
As of June 2025, Walmart said it has completed more than 150,000 successful drone deliveries since 2021.
Wing says its top 25 percent of customers order three times a week, with deliveries tripling from the first six months of 2025 to the latter half.
“Drone delivery plays an important role in our ability to deliver what customers want, exactly when they want it. Whether it’s a last-minute ingredient for dinner, a must-have charger for a phone, or a late-night essential for a busy family, the strong adoption we’ve seen confirms that this is the future of convenience,” said Greg Cathey, senior vice president of digital fulfillment transformation at Walmart, in a statement. “By expanding drone delivery to new major metro areas, we are helping more customers solve for their last-minute needs faster than ever before.”
Walmart has had partnerships with multiple drone delivery providers since piloting the technology in Fayetteville, N.C. with Flytrex in September 2020. Another competitor in the space, Zipline, has collaborated with the retailer in select areas of Texas and Arkansas.
Walmart was a former investor in DroneUp, but the contract between the firms expired in late 2024. That partnership covered metro areas including Dallas-Fort Worth; Phoenix, Salt Lake City and Tampa, Fla., but was scaled back to exclusively focus on Texas before the end of their contract.
The rollout of these drone delivery programs has been infrequent due to regulatory holdups regarding the safety of the technology, and the ability for drones to operate in poor weather conditions.
But after years at a snail’s pace, the tide could be changing. In August, the Department of Transportation (DOT) proposed a new rule related to the permits drones need to fly beyond a human’s visual line of sight. Under the rule, the process for obtaining permission could become less of a hassle for businesses, as it would effectively grant companies a per-drone operating license.
Typically, drone operators need either individual waivers, or employees manning each device, forfeiting any cost savings on labor compared with using delivery drivers. Such a move potentially increases the speed of adoption for drone-based e-commerce deliveries.
Wing’s drones are built to carry goods up to five pounds and can travel six miles each way. Once the items are picked and packed in a small cardboard basket, they are loaded onto a drone inside a fenced area in the Walmart parking lot.
Drones fly autonomously to the designated address, with human pilots monitoring each flight from a central operations hub. According to Wing, the orders arrive in 30 minutes or less.
“We’ve spent years building our technology to ensure that when you realize you’re out of eggs or need over-the-counter medicine, the solution is just a few taps away, seamlessly integrated into existing store operations” said Adam Woodworth, Wing CEO in a statement. “We believe even the smallest package deserves the speed and reliability of a great delivery service. Working with Walmart has allowed us to prove that delivering these critical, everyday items in minutes makes a significant difference for families. We are proud to bring that capability to more communities across the country.”
Walmart offers drone delivery free to Walmart+ members and charges $19.99 per delivery for other customers, according to its website. Shoppers can also get free delivery by ordering through the Wing app.
The announcement coincided with Walmart’s unveiling of a partnership with Wing’s sister company, Google, at the National Retail Federation’s Big Show in New York on Sunday. The two giants are teaming up to incorporate agentic AI using Google Gemini into the online shopping experience at the retailer.
