Dividend Kings, or companies that have increased their dividend once a year for at least 50 years, are exceedingly rare. As of late 2025, just 56 stocks, out of around 54,000 traded around the world, had earned this distinction.
But I would argue that in one sense, Dividend Kings are even rarer than these numbers suggest. To my mind, companies that raise dividends at a slower rate than inflation, for a few years at a time, are actually handing out de facto dividend cuts, as their payouts do less for shareholders over time. The industrial machinery company Dover is an example of this. Last September, it announced a dividend increase of just half a penny per share, or a less than 1% raise that lagged the 2.7% inflation rate. Over the last five years, it has raised its dividend by 5% amid the 20% inflation seen since 2021.
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These nominal payout increases may be enough to maintain official Dividend King status. But checks that can buy less each year aren't what income investors are looking for. The best Dividend Kings aren't just keeping up with inflation -- they're issuing dividend hikes that leave inflation in the dust.
Here are three Dividend Kings that, after at least half a century of payout increases, are still raising dividends by 10% a year.
No. 1: Automatic Data Processing
Headquartered in Roseland, New Jersey, Automatic Data Processing (ADP 1.72%) is a newly crowned Dividend King, having announced its 50th consecutive dividend increase in 2024. Last November, it announced a 10% dividend increase, and since 2021, the leader in cloud-based human capital solutions has raised its dividend by 83%, handily outpacing the 20% inflation in that time frame. Its dividend yield of 2.6% is also well above the S&P 500 average of 1.2%.
NASDAQ: ADP
Key Data Points
Even more impressively, the company sustained this dividend momentum while returning billions of dollars more cash to shareholders through share repurchases. Share buybacks are shareholder-friendly because they can boost earnings per share (EPS), and ultimately share price, by reducing the number of shares outstanding. They can also make dividend growth more sustainable for the same reason: With fewer shares to pay dividends on, it's easier for management to increase dividends. Since 2015, Automatic Data Processing has repurchased $12 billion in shares while paying out $15 billion in dividends. Its payout ratio of 61%, which means it pays 61% of its net income toward its dividend, is also in the range considered sustainable for dividend stocks.
No. 2: Walmart
The Arkansas-based retail giant Walmart (WMT +0.88%) announced a 13% dividend increase last February, making 2025 its 52nd year of back-to-back dividend hikes. Shares currently pay a yield of 0.84%, which is below the S&P 500 average. However, this yield of below 1% is a product of Walmart's booming share price, as the stock has roared 130% higher over the last five years. Its dividend has grown 28% in that time frame. While not a huge number, it is comfortably ahead of inflation, and there are good reasons to believe that Walmart's recent 13% hike is the start of a robust period of dividend growth.
NASDAQ: WMT
Key Data Points
The company, which recently began trading on the tech-heavy Nasdaq, reflecting its technological innovations and investments in e-commerce platforms and artificial intelligence (AI) tools, has now grown its e-commerce sales by over 20% for seven consecutive quarters, including a 27% increase last quarter. And while same-store sales in the U.S. rose by 4.5%, sales in China increased by 22%. With operating cash flow of $27 billion over the last fiscal year, Walmart has $4.5 billion more available for dividends, share buybacks, and potential acquisitions than it did the year prior. If you assume that just one-third of that goes toward increasing the dividend, that alone would amount to an 18.8% dividend increase this year.
No. 3: Lowe's
Last May, the home improvement retailer giant Lowe's (LOW 1.90%) announced its 61st annual dividend increase, putting it well beyond the half-century mark for Dividend Kings.
NYSE: LOW
Key Data Points
While its 2025 dividend increase was just 4%, this smaller increase was likely due to the company's recent $8.8 billion acquisition of Foundation Building Materials, a leading North American distributor of interior building products. The acquisition, in the words of Lowe's CEO Marvin Ellison, will allow Lowe's to further target a $250 billion addressable market and offer faster fulfillment, improved digital tools, and expanded capabilities to Lowe's Pro customers.
Over the last five years, Lowe's has doubled its dividend, a 100% increase that amounts to an average annual increase of 14.9%. With Foundation Building Materials having brought in $6.5 billion in revenue in 2024, the year before Lowe's acquired it, and $635 million in adjusted earnings, this robust dividend growth could resume in 2026.
For investors seeking industry-dominating stocks with a clear record of rewarding income, these three Dividend Kings are strong buys.
