Grocery Prices Around the World: The Same Basket in 4 Countries
Updated October 19, 2026. Updated monthly.
We now run the same staple-basket tracker in four countries: Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia. This page puts them side by side. Every price comes from the country trackers linked below, checked the week of October 19, 2026. Nothing here is a new price; it is the same data, converted.
Conversions use the Bank of Canada daily exchange rates for 16 October 2026, the most recent business day when we checked: US$1 = C$1.4154, £1 = C$1.8652, A$1 = C$0.9813. That makes C$1 worth US$0.7065, £1 worth US$1.3178, and A$1 worth US$0.6933. Converted figures are rounded to the nearest cent.
Each country's basket, as published
Canada: the full 14-item basket at Real Canadian Superstore (British Columbia) cost C$91.28, which converts to US$64.49. This is the only complete 14-item basket of the four, because Superstore published every line.
United States: no store published a complete comparable basket. On the 12 staples priced the same way at both stores we could check, Target totaled US$42.28 and H-E-B US$43.05.
United Kingdom: on the six staples verified in identical sizes at three chains, Tesco totaled £15.12 (US$19.93), Sainsbury's £15.62 and Asda £16.23. Tesco's 11 individually verified basket lines totaled £26.43 (US$34.83).
Australia: on the 13 staples in the latest like-for-like tracker readings, Woolworths totaled A$69.36 (US$48.09) and Coles A$70.20 (US$48.67).
Read those four totals carefully: they are different baskets (14, 12, 6 and 13 items) built to each country's pack norms, so they show scale, not ranking. The honest comparison is per unit, item by item, which is the rest of this page.
Milk, per litre
United Kingdom: £0.73 a litre, US$0.96. The cheapest milk of the four, tied at £1.65 for 4 pints across Tesco, Sainsbury's and Asda.
United States: US$1.09 a litre on the BLS national average ($4.11 a gallon, September 2026). Target's shelf price was lower, $2.99 a gallon, about US$0.79 a litre.
Canada: C$1.61 a litre (C$6.44 for 4L at Superstore), US$1.14. Australia: A$1.65 a litre on the 3L house-brand bottle, US$1.14. Canada and Australia land in a dead heat once converted.
Eggs, per dozen
United States: US$2.27 a dozen on the BLS average, and as low as US$1.49 at Target. US eggs are the cheapest of the four by a wide margin after the 20.6% year-over-year fall in the BLS egg index.
Canada: C$3.93 a dozen at Superstore, US$2.78.
United Kingdom: £3.35 a dozen for large free range at Sainsbury's, US$4.41 (medium free range £2.95, US$3.89). Australia: A$6.60 a dozen free range at Coles, US$4.58. The UK and Australian dozens are free range as standard, which explains part, but not all, of the gap to North America.
Butter, per kilogram
Canada: C$13.19 a kilo (C$5.99 for the 454g block at Superstore), US$9.32. The cheapest butter of the four.
Australia: A$14.00 a kilo (the 500g salted block at Coles), US$9.71. United Kingdom: £7.40 a kilo, identical at four chains, US$9.75. Australia and the UK are within four cents of each other converted.
United States: US$14.51 a kilo on Target's 8 oz block price ($3.29). US butter is the outlier at the top, more than 50% above the Canadian per-kilo price.
Chicken breast, per kilogram
Canada: C$10.76 a kilo at Superstore, US$7.60, with the caveat printed in the Canada tracker: that line was on sale when checked.
Australia: A$12.50 a kilo regular reading at Coles for free range fillets, US$8.67, and A$8.50 a kilo on catalogue special this week, which converts to US$5.89 and would top this table. United States: US$8.80 a kilo at Target ($3.99 a pound).
United Kingdom: £6.90 a kilo at Tesco and Sainsbury's, US$9.09, the highest standard price of the four. The UK budget tier at Aldi, £4.25 a kilo (US$5.60), shows how much of the gap is tier rather than country.
Ground beef and mince, per kilogram
Australia: A$15.00 a kilo for regular mince at Coles, US$10.40. The cheapest beef of the four, even in a year when the ABS has beef up 9.4%.
Canada: C$18.72 a kilo for lean ground beef at Superstore, US$13.23. United States: US$14.97 a kilo on the BLS average ($6.79 a pound). North American beef costs more per kilo than Australian mince in October 2026.
United Kingdom: no standard mince price could be verified this month, so the UK gets no ranking. The one verified anchor, Tesco Finest 5% Aberdeen Angus at £13.00 a kilo (US$17.13), is a premium line and is not comparable to the standard lines above.
Bananas, per kilogram
United States: US$0.79 a kilo (H-E-B at $0.36 a pound). Canada: C$1.52 a kilo, US$1.07. United Kingdom: £0.90 a kilo, US$1.19. Three countries within about 40 cents of each other.
Australia: A$4.90 a kilo at Coles, US$3.40. Australian bananas cost more than four times the US price per kilo. The reason is structural: Australia grows its own bananas behind strict biosecurity rules and effectively does not import them, so the price is set by domestic supply and Queensland weather, not the world market.
What this comparison can and cannot say
Currency conversion is not cost of living. These figures compare shelf prices at one exchange rate on one date; they say nothing about wages, and a basket that looks cheap in US dollars may not feel cheap on a local income. We publish the conversion because it is the only common ruler available, and we label its limits.
Pack norms differ: milk sells by the 4L jug in Canada, the gallon in the US, 4 pints in the UK and a 3L bottle in Australia. Per-unit pricing (per litre, per kilo, per dozen) is our normalisation, and where a country's standard product differs in kind, free range eggs in the UK and Australia, for example, we say so.
Every figure traces to the country trackers linked below, each of which states its sources and its own gaps, including the prices we could not verify at Walmart in North America, Morrisons in the UK, and Woolworths directly in Australia. This page is refreshed monthly as the trackers and exchange rates update.
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