How we measure — and why we publish the bits that don’t flatter us.

Latest run

August 2026 — the same basket, four ways to buy it.

Priced from the 5 Aug 2026 catalogue · Metropolitan Melbourne · WiseList price data · 1 line on special · 2 converted by unit price · per-item breakdown (CSV)

Axis starts at $105.00 — not $0 — so the real spread is visible instead of exaggerated.

The basket

Thirty-four items — the weekly mix of fresh, meat, dairy, pantry, frozen, cleaning and personal care. The composition is fixed: it only changes at an annual review, and every change is recorded in the log below.

Where the basket comes from: it’s built around the items WiseList users add to their lists most often — bananas, milk, chicken breast and their neighbours — not around items chosen to make any store look good.

The rules

Numbered so anyone — including the supermarkets — can cite exactly which rule they disagree with.

• Cheapest item meeting the spec, any brand.

  For every line we take the cheapest product in that store that satisfies the spec — own brand or name brand. That’s how price-conscious shoppers actually buy, and it’s the only fair way to compare ALDI’s private-label range against the majors.

• Sizes are normalised.

  Every line has a target pack size. We take the cheapest pack close to that size — inside the size window printed against each line in the basket table — at its shelf price. If a store only sells the item in a different size, we take its best-value pack between half and double the target and convert the price to the target size using the unit price — and flag that line in the breakdown. Produce sold by the piece is priced by the piece; chicken is priced per kilo from the unit price; toothpaste, shampoo and toilet paper are priced per gram, per millilitre and per sheet, because pack sizes differ too much between stores to compare them any other way.

• Specials count.

  If an item is on special in that week’s catalogue, the special price is used — that’s the price you’d pay. Lines bought on special are flagged in the breakdown.

• One region, stated.

  Prices are for metropolitan Melbourne. Regional prices can differ, especially for produce.

• Prices come from the product, not a clipboard.

  Figures are drawn from WiseList’s own weekly price data — the same catalogue the app prices from that week, captured on the Wednesday the supermarkets’ specials change. Each published run is cross-checked against a logged Split by Store run in the app. The test is the product doing its job in public.

• “Split by Store” means the cheapest two-store plan.

  The split total is what you’d pay buying each item at the cheaper of the two stores in the plan — the best of the three possible pairs, the same way the app’s Split by Store works. The three-store minimum is in the breakdown for completeness, but it isn’t the headline figure: three supermarkets in one week isn’t a practical shop. When the split isn’t meaningfully better than the cheapest single store, we print that.

• Gaps are flagged, never filled in by hand.

  If a product is missing from a store’s catalogue in the test week, we use that product’s price from the nearest week it was listed, and say so in the breakdown. We never substitute a different product quietly, and we never type a price in by hand.

• The basket is frozen.

  Item composition changes only at an annual review, with every amendment listed in the change log. We never adjust the basket to change a result.

What this test can’t tell you

• Your basket isn’t this basket — brand loyalties, dietary needs and household size change the result.
• Own-brand and name-brand products aren’t always equivalent in quality; Rule R1 compares prices, not taste tests.
• Stock varies by store. Where an item was missing from a catalogue, the breakdown says which week its price came from (Rule R7).
• The split assumes you’re willing to visit two supermarkets in a week. Petrol and time aren’t counted.
• A month is a snapshot. The archive below matters more than any single run.

Archive

One row per monthly run. Full per-item breakdowns are downloadable so any figure can be checked.

Change log

Every amendment to the basket or the rules, dated.