Walmart takes on Amazon Prime with free, next-day deliveries

Walmart has introduced its answer to Amazon's one-day shipping for Prime subscribers. The retail giant's NextDay delivery offering is rolling out in Phoenix and Las Vegas today, May 14th, and will be available for online customers in Southern California over the next few days. It's more of a curated shopping experience than an option shoppers can choose for any item on Walmart's website. But so long as they find the products they'e looking for among the 220,000 items listed on the portal, Walmart's might even be a better deal than Prime's. It's free and requires no membership, after all -- they just need to meet a $35 minimum order.

Although the number of items that qualify for next-day delivery is limited, they include products people frequently purchase such as diapers and liquid detergent. They'll find toys and electronics in the separate tab for the feature, as well, though the items available will vary depending on their location. Customers simply have to make sure all the items in their cart are from the curated list to be able to quality for next-day shipping.

Walmart says introducing the feature is a smart business move for the company, because it actually costs less to ship out multiple goods in a single box from a fulfillment center located closest to the customer than to ship out multiple boxes from all over the country. The retail giant will roll out the offering to more locations in the coming months, including 40 of the top 50 major cities in the US, with the intention of making it accessible to 75 percent of the US population by the end of the year.