Free tool
Grocery Budget Calculator
How much should groceries cost for your household? Pick who you feed, how you like to eat and where you shop. The estimate is anchored to the USDA food plans (April 2026) and adjusted the way the USDA does for household size.
range —
per person per week: —
Dinner is roughly 40% of the food budget. This is the number Mittsy plans each night against.
Now hit that number every week
Set this budget once in Mittsy. It plans seven dinners against it, priced at your store, with the pantry already subtracted.
How the estimate is built
The USDA publishes the monthly cost of a nutritious diet at four price levels for a reference family of two adults and two children aged 6 to 11. We split that into a per-person share (an adult counts as 1.15 shares, a child 6 to 11 as 0.85, a teenager as 1.2, and a child under 6 as 0.65), multiply by your household, then apply the USDA’s own household-size adjustments: +20% for one person, +10% for two, −5% for five or six, −10% for seven or more.
The store factor is ours, from the price table Mittsy uses: discount chains run about 10% under a standard supermarket on the same basket, premium stores about 25% over. Eating out replaces meals, so the last selector scales the whole number down.
It’s an estimate. Real weeks swing with what’s in your pantry, what’s on sale and how much protein you buy. The way to hit the number is to plan the week before you shop, which is what Mittsy does.
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Grocery Budget for Family of 4: Realistic 2026 Numbers
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Questions people ask
How much should a family of 4 spend on groceries per week?
Using the USDA Cost of Food report for April 2026, a family of four (two adults, two children aged 6 to 11) spends about $234 a week on the Thrifty plan, $258 on Low-cost, $318 on Moderate and $385 on Liberal, cooking every meal at home. Most families land between Low-cost and Moderate. The calculator above adjusts these for your household and the kind of store you shop at.
What is a reasonable grocery budget for two people?
For two adults, the USDA plans work out to roughly $130 to $215 a week in 2026, after the 10% adjustment the USDA applies to two-person households. Shopping at a discount chain such as Aldi or Walmart trims that further; a premium store adds to it.
What are the USDA food plans?
The U.S. Department of Agriculture publishes four food plans every month: Thrifty, Low-cost, Moderate-cost and Liberal. Each is the cost of a nutritious diet prepared at home at a given price level. The Thrifty plan is the basis for SNAP benefits. This calculator uses the April 2026 report as its anchor.
How do I calculate my grocery budget?
Start from who you feed: add up the USDA weekly cost for each person by age on the plan that matches how you shop (Thrifty, Low-cost, Moderate or Liberal), apply the household-size adjustment, then shift it for your store. That is exactly what this calculator does; multiply the weekly figure by 4.33 for a monthly budget.
Is this a USDA grocery budget calculator?
Yes. It uses the per-person figures from the USDA Cost of Food report (April 2026) for all four food plans and the USDA household-size adjustments. The store setting is our own addition, so discount and premium shoppers see a realistic range rather than one national average.
Why does the calculator adjust for household size?
Bigger households buy bigger packs and waste less per person, so the USDA scales its per-person figures: one person costs about 20% more, two people 10% more, five or six people 5% less, seven or more 10% less. The calculator applies the same adjustments.
How does Mittsy keep a real week under this number?
The app plans seven dinners against the weekly budget you set, prices every ingredient at the store you shop at, subtracts what is already in your pantry, and shows a budget bar that turns green when you are under. Prices are estimates, but they are accurate enough to see a $70 week before you leave the house.
Now plan a week that actually hits the number.
Mittsy plans seven dinners against your weekly budget, priced at your store, with the pantry already subtracted. Free on iOS and Android.