We compared prices for a basket of 52 popular grocery items each day during the month of June. Our price tracking found that, on average, shoppers would have paid £75.61 for the basket at Aldi – that’s £1.38 cheaper than rival discounter Lidl.
The most expensive supermarket was £25.53 pricier than Aldi for an equivalent basket of groceries.
Cheapest supermarket for a basket of groceries
Every day in June, we checked the prices of 52 popular groceries, including seedless grapes, white bread and tea bags, to compare supermarkets with each other.
We don’t compare the same items each month due to changes in product availability. Furthermore, this month we have updated our basket to take into account changing grocery trends and availability.
It’s the first time in seven months that Aldi has been the cheapest – beating Lidl, which had previously claimed the title six months in a row.
Of the ‘big four’ supermarkets, Asda was the cheapest, with the basket costing £85.22. The most expensive supermarket for this basket was Waitrose, at £101.14 – £25.53 more than Aldi.
Of course, price is just one factor when you’re deciding which supermarket to shop at. We also survey shoppers on their experiences of supermarkets’ product quality, customer service, store experience, online deliveries and a range of other factors to reveal the best and worst supermarkets each year
How do bigger shopping lists compare?
We also compared costs from a larger trolley of 156 products (the original basket plus 104 more).
This trolley included a larger number of branded items, such as Andrex toilet paper and Cathedral City cheese. You can’t always find these items in discounter supermarkets, so we haven’t included Aldi or Lidl in this comparison.
Asda was the cheapest supermarket for this trolley, continuing its streak as the cheapest traditional supermarket that started in January 2020. It cost £336.89 on average for this trolley of items, that’s £12.67 cheaper than its nearest rival Sainsbury’s.
How Which? compares supermarket prices
We look at the prices of hundreds of grocery items at eight major supermarkets every day throughout the year using an independent price comparison website.
For each superstore, we work out the average price for each item across the month. Then we add those up to get each store’s average trolley price. To keep things fair, we include special offer prices but we don’t count multibuys or loyalty scheme discounts.
Our shopping list includes branded items like Heinz Baked Beans and Dolmio sauce, as well as own-brand products like apples and lettuce. Own-brand items won’t be identical across supermarkets, but we’ve used experts to ensure everything we’ve compared is as similar as possible, based on a number of factors including quality and weight.’
How has inflation affected grocery prices?
Food inflation continues to dominate the headlines, with like-for-like grocery prices rising by 8.3% over the past month, according to market analysts Kantar. That’s up 1.3 percentage points on May – and the highest level since April 2009. It means the average annual grocery bill is on course to rise by £380.
Prices are rising fastest in categories such as dog food, butter and milk, while falling in spirits.
Last month also saw the announcement that the UK statistics office is to look at how inflation varies in different parts of the country.
