China makes up just 3 percent of Walmart's overall business, but it's been one of the company's fastest-growing pieces. Sales there hit $24.6 billion in the past fiscal year, up 19.3 percent, and grew another 20.7 percent last quarter alone, more than triple the company's overall growth rate of 5.9 percent.
That growth is happening against a genuinely weak backdrop. China's retail sales overall grew just 1.1 percent in the first eight months of the year, down sharply from 4.6 percent growth over the same stretch in 2025, a slowdown that has weighed on most retailers operating in the country.
The executive overseeing Walmart's outperformance is Christina Zhu, president and CEO of Walmart China since May 2020, the first woman and first Chinese native to hold the role. She joined Walmart after working at McKinsey and Honeywell. The bulk of the growth is coming from one format in particular: Sam's Club, which now accounts for roughly 70 percent of Walmart's China revenue. The warehouse chain has expanded from 15 clubs in 2016 to 67 by May 2026, and had 10.7 million members as of June, each paying at least 260 yuan, about $39, a year for basic membership.
Part of what's driving that growth, according to Zhu, is how differently Chinese consumers define convenience compared with Walmart's other markets. "Convenience here means 30 minutes," she said, a standard that makes a typical three-day delivery window elsewhere look almost leisurely by comparison. Former Walmart CEO Doug McMillon has said 80 percent of orders in China now arrive within an hour, made possible by treating each store as a fulfillment hub within what the company calls a "cloud warehouse" network rather than purely a shopping destination.
Sam's Club has built its China business around upper-middle-class families, offering a curated, premium selection at discounted prices rather than the broad, everything-under-one-roof approach of a typical warehouse club. That positioning has traveled beyond the mainland: the chain has started drawing Hong Kong tourists crossing the border specifically to shop there, a sign of how much pull the format has built even as China's broader retail environment has cooled.