Cheapest places for your Christmas dinner staples revealed in new research, but where does your usual supermarket rank on the list?

New research has ranked the nation's favourite supermarkets from cheapest to most expensive for Christmas dinner essentials

Happy family laughing over Christmas dinner table
(Image credit: Getty Images)

With Christmas just around the corner, families across the country are starting to firm up their plans for the big day. And one of the biggest considerations for those celebrating Christmas will be a classic Christmas dinner. 

With family budgets still impacted by the high cost of living, shopping at the cheapest supermarket will be key for those looking to keep their Christmas costs under control. And new research from Which? has analysed the cost of Christmas dinner essentials from the most popular supermarkets and ranked them - and there's probably no surprise as to which budget supermarket reigned supreme. Yep folks, Aldi is the cheapest place to buy all the bits and bobs you need for a classic Christmas feast. (If you're never sure if Aldi or Lidl is cheaper, we did our own experiment to find out.)

Which?'s research compared the price of 12 popular Christmas table items, including turkey, potatoes, parsnips, sprouts, and Christmas pudding. Whether you are planning on sticking with your usual supermarket or trying somewhere different to get something special for Christmas, where does your chosen supermarket land on the list? 

Cheapest place to buy Christmas dinner essentials - ranked

Aldi is the cheapest place to get your Christmas dinner staples, like turkey, roasties and sprouts, with the total shop coming in at £33.80, with Lidl only 4p more expensive. Waitrose is the most expensive, with those Christmas dinner items totalling £52.68, almost 56% more than the Aldi equivalent.

  • Aldi - £33.80
  • Lidl - £33.84
  • Asda - £37.01
  • Tesco - £39.49
  • Sainsbury's - £44.81
  • Morrisons - 45.34
  • Waitrose - £52.68

It probably helps that Aldi introduced a Christmas Price Lock this festive season, which will see prices of key food staples locked in at 2022 prices.

How to keep the cost of your Christmas food shop under control

If you have more mouths to feed than usual this Christmas, then it pays to know all the tricks to keep the costs as low as possible, without compromising on quality.

  • Don't just look at eye level in the supermarket - this is where supermarkets tend to put their most expensive items
  • Write a list before you shop, and be specific
  • Make sure you know when you'll be eating what - this will help you when checking use by dates so that you don't end up wasting the food you buy
  • Buy a brand level lower - in most cases, you won't be able to taste a difference (the difference is likely to be in the attractiveness of the packaging)
  • Avoid pre-chopped fruit and veg, you'll pay a premium for someone to cut it for you, when it will probably only take you a minute to do it yourself

Check out these other sneaky ways supermarkets get you to spend more money, and how you can beat them, as well as how to save money on food for more ideas to keep your Christmas dinner costs as low as they can be.

Sarah Handley
Money Editor, Goodto.com

Sarah is Goodto.com’s Money Editor, covering various aspects of family finance - everything from energy price cap, cost of living payments and food prices to major sales, money saving tips and how to get more for less. A writer, journalist and editor with more than 15 years' experience, Sarah is allergic to confusing jargon and hates money-saving hacks that don’t actually save you money. As well as putting a spotlight on the money news that will actually impact your family life, Sarah is also the Goodto team’s guru on how to tell a good deal from a dud and the best way to dodge price hikes. When not writing about money, or picking the brains of leading personal finance experts, Sarah can be found hanging out with her rockstar dog Pepsi, getting opinionated about a movie or learning British Sign Language.