Asda's New Premium Meal Deal: What You're Getting for £5

Asda's New Premium Meal Deal: What You're Getting for £5

Asda has launched a new Premium Meal Deal at £5, rolling out nationwide from 18th May. The question for budget-conscious shoppers is straightforward: Does it represent better value than equivalent offers elsewhere?

The deal includes a main, a snack, and a drink, which is pretty normal these days, but what sets it apart is the main menu: Asda's new range, called "Exceptional," offers a wider selection than typical meal deal offerings. You can choose from 17 different mains, including Chicken Parmigiana, Beef Birria Wrap, hand-rolled sushi, and premium salads.

For context, Asda's classic meal deal (the one that's been around since 2025) still costs just £3.74. So upgrading to this new range costs only £1.26 extra. That's useful to know if you're budget-conscious but fancy something a bit more indulgent for lunch.

How Asda's £5 Deal Compares to Tesco, Sainsbury's and Co-op

Here's where we can test the value claim, as Asda says its Premium Meal Deal undercuts the competition, so let's check those numbers:

• Asda Premium Meal Deal: £5 (no membership required) 

• Tesco Finest Meal Deal: £5.50 with Clubcard, £6 without

• Sainsbury's Premium Meal Deal: £5.50

• Co-op Premium Meal Deal: £5.50 for members, £6 without

Based on these numbers, Asda is winning. You're saving 50p compared to Tesco Clubcard holders, and 50p to £1 if you're not a member elsewhere. That might not sound massive, but it adds up if you're buying lunch regularly. Over a working month (roughly 20 lunch days), that's £10 to £20 back in your pocket.

A key question is whether the quality is comparable across the range. Asda's Exceptional range includes deli-inspired focaccia, birria wraps with dipping sauces, and hand-finished sushi rolls. Whether the offering justifies switching from your current supermarket depends on your priorities.

The Best Value Mains in Asda's Exceptional Range

If you're going to try this deal, some options stand out more than others for value.

The Chicken Caesar Shake-A-Salad is worth flagging. Asda notes that a comparable salad costs £5.75 elsewhere, just for the salad. Here, you're getting the salad, plus a snack and drink, for £5 total. That's a significant saving if you usually buy premium salads.

The Beef Birria Wrap contains British beef and comes with a birria dipping sauce. Wraps in this premium category usually cost £4 to £5 on their own, so bundling them with a snack and drink for £5 represents reasonable value.

The Prosciutto Cotto and Milano Salami Focaccia is the kind of thing you'd normally find in a deli counter, charging £4 to £5 before tax. Focaccia with Italian meats and pesto mayo, bundled into a meal deal, offers a comparison point.

The sushi options (Asda's own hand-finished Dragon Rolls, plus YO Sushi selections) are present if you want something lighter. Hand-rolled sushi at supermarket prices usually sits around £3.50 to £4, so the meal deal packaging makes it good value.

What Are The Products In The New Asda Exceptional Range? The Full Exceptional Premium Meal Deal range includes: 

• Exceptional Pesto & Mozzarella Pasta Salad  

• Exceptional Steak & Onion Chutney Sandwich  

• Exceptional New York Deli Sandwich  

• Exceptional Chicken Parmigiana Sandwich  

• Exceptional Prawn Cocktail Sandwich  

• Exceptional Prosciutto Cotto and Milano Salami Focaccia 

• Exceptional Chicken Caesar Wrap with Caesar Dip  

• Exceptional Beef Birria Wrap with Birria Dipping Sauce  

• Exceptional Chicken Caesar Shake-A-Salad  

• Exceptional Barbers Cheddar Ploughman’s Deli Sandwich 

• Chicken Katsu Dragon Roll Sushi  

• Spicy Prawn Dragon Roll Sushi  

• YO Sushi Salmon Poke  

• YO Sushi Vegetarian Sushi 

• YO Sushi Salmon Roll 

• YO Sushi Katsu Poke  

• YO Sushi Katsu Roll 

Is the Premium Meal Deal Worth Upgrading From Asda's Classic Deal?

This depends entirely on your appetite and preferences. The classic meal deal at £3.74 is genuinely hard to beat if you just want lunch sorted on a budget. But if you're the type to spend £5 to £6 on lunch anyway, the Premium option is worth considering.

The question isn't really "is £5 cheap?" but rather "if I'm going to spend around that much anyway, does Asda offer better value than Tesco or Sainsbury's?" And on the numbers, yes. It does. You're saving 50p to £1 compared to equivalent premium deals elsewhere, and the food quality looks higher.

For occasional purchasers, the savings are modest, but for people buying lunch three to five days a week, it's worth considering, since that's £10 to £20 a month, or £120 to £240 a year in savings.

The Penny Pincher Tip: Lunch Spending and Real-World Savings

Obviously, the cheapest option is always to take your own lunch from home. But time is a factor for many people, and the reality is that most of us buy lunch at least occasionally. If you're going to do it, taking advantage of meal deals with genuine value makes sense, especially when you layer in cashback apps and loyalty points.

Here's why the maths matters. If you spend £5 a day on lunch, every working day, that's £25 a week, £100 a month, or around £1,200 a year. That's a considerable amount. Even if you cut back to four days a week, you're looking at £20 a week, £80 a month, or around £240 a year saved compared to a more expensive supermarket option. That's roughly the cost of a weekend away or a decent holiday fund contribution, so if you can drop even just one day of buying lunch, then that's money saved, and don't even get me started on the cost of buying coffee every day ;)

The point isn't that meal deals are cheap. It's that if you're buying lunch anyway, choosing the better-value option has real financial benefits over the year.

How to Make the Most of Your Meal Deal with Cashback Apps

How you pay for your meal deal can also make a difference. If you use a gift card cashback service like JamDoughnut, you can get between 3 and 3.5 per cent cashback on buying the gift card itself, and then use that card to pay. So that's an immediate 3 to 3.5 per cent saving on your lunch, depending on the rate at the time. It might not sound like much per transaction, but over a year, it adds up significantly.

The main thing to note is that most gift card services require a minimum purchase of £10. So if you're only buying a £5 meal deal once a week, it might not be the most practical approach. However, if you're doing a weekly food shop for other items at the same time, you can buy a gift card and use it across multiple purchases, not just lunch.

There's also a smart budgeting move here, as if you know you're going to the supermarket five days a week to buy lunch, buy a £25 gift card at the beginning of the week; it'll cover you for the week and is an excellent way to control your spending! Once the card's been used up, you can't spend any more, so it removes the temptation to overspend because you've set a fixed budget for the week.

This works even better for longer-term budgeting, because if you know you're going to buy lunch most days, buy a £100 gift card when you get paid and use that as your monthly lunch budget; once it's gone, that's it, you've spent your allocated amount, and you can't exceed it; It's a simple but effective way to stop overspending on lunch and to see exactly how much you're actually spending over a month or a year.

FAQs

When does Asda's Premium Meal Deal launch? From Monday, 18th May 2026, in all participating Asda stores nationwide, including Asda Express.

Do I need a membership to get the £5 price? No. Unlike Tesco (which charges £6 without a Clubcard) or Co-op (which charges £6 for non-members), Asda's £5 price is available to everyone.

What's the difference between the Premium and classic meal deals? The classic meal deal costs £3.74 and has a more standard range of mains. The Premium deal costs £5 and offers more indulgent, deli-inspired options, such as focaccia, birria wraps, and hand-finished sushi.

Can I get the same options as a standalone purchase, without the meal deal? Yes, but you'll pay more. The whole point of the meal deal is that bundling the main, snack, and drink saves you money compared to buying them separately.

Is this worth switching supermarkets for? If you regularly buy lunch deals, the 50p saving adds up. But whether it's worth changing your weekly shopping depends on other factors. Loyalty schemes, location convenience, and overall basket prices all matter.

Which mains offer the best value? The Chicken Caesar Salad (comparable salads elsewhere cost £5.75 alone) and the Beef Birria Wrap are options worth considering. The focaccia options offer similar positioning if you'd normally spend £4 to £5 on a deli sandwich.