Historic | Walmart’s end has arrived and it is no longer the best supermarket of all: Amazon beat it and that is why it is the most preferred

For the first time in more than a decade, Amazon took the number one spot in the Fortune 500 from Walmart, the annual ranking that measures the largest U.S. companies by total revenue. The company founded by Jeff Bezos posted $717 billion in revenue in 2025, surpassing Walmart’s $713 billion and ending 13 years of uninterrupted dominance by the supermarket giant.

The latest edition of the list, published by Fortune magazine, places Amazon in first place, followed by Walmart and UnitedHealth Group. It is the first time since 2012 that Walmart has fallen from the top of the list, and only four companies in the entire history of the ranking have held that position: Amazon, Walmart, ExxonMobil, and General Motors.

Why did Amazon surpass Walmart and become the most chosen company?

Amazon did not displace Walmart just because of retail sales: it did so thanks to a diversified business model that goes far beyond e-commerce. Its revenue grew 12% year over year, more than double the 5% growth Walmart recorded in the same period.

The pillars that drove that leap are concrete and measurable:

• Amazon Web Services (AWS): generated $129 billion in revenue, with growth of 20% compared with the previous year.
• Digital advertising: Amazon’s advertising division surpassed $68 billion in revenue.
• E-commerce and third-party seller services: maintained steady growth in the core retail business.

While Walmart remains the undisputed leader in physical retail in the United States, Amazon built a high-margin digital ecosystem that no competitor has been able to replicate.

What does this change mean for consumers and the market?

Walmart’s fall in rank in the Fortune 500 does not mean the supermarket chain has lost relevance for everyday shoppers: its physical stores remain the most visited in the country.

What changed is each company’s overall economic weight, measured in annual revenue.

For consumers, Amazon’s rise reflects a clear behavior pattern: more and more households in the United States are combining in-store shopping with e-commerce, subscription services like Prime, and the consumption of digital products.

Amazon debuted in the Fortune 500 at No. 492 a little over two decades ago; today it leads the most influential list in the U.S. economy.