Prices and specs last checked by Look Into on 23 October 2026 · next check 18 December 2026 · how we picked
Key figures
The Cabinet Office launched the Be Ready campaign on 22 October 2026, asking households to be ready for three days of disruption. We priced every item on its checklist that has a shop price, at Sainsbury's, Argos and Amazon UK on 23 October 2026.
- Following the Be Ready checklist costs £57.88 per person at budget level, £121.43 mid-range and £304.76 premium.
- A household of four can be ready for £88.42. Water and food scale with people; the torch, radio, power bank, first aid kit and hygiene items are shared. That is £22.11 a head.
- Water is the smallest cost: 9 litres for one person cost £3.00 (Sainsbury's 6 x 2L).
- The power bank is the biggest single cost in both the budget (25.9%) and mid-range (24.7%) kits.
- Pre-made kits cost more and hold less. A £71.85 "72-hour" kit for one person holds 0.6 litres of water and has no radio or power bank. The budget kit costs £13.97 less and includes 12 litres.
The 2026 baskets (one person, three days)
| Item (Be Ready wording) | Budget | Mid-range | Premium | Pool |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bottled water, 3 litres a day (9 litres) | Sainsbury's Spring Water 6 x 2L, £3.00 | Nestle Pure Life 12 x 500ml x2, £5.30 | Evian 12 x 330ml x3, £14.25 | 15 |
| Food needing no fridge or cooking (6,000kcal) | Sainsbury's no-cook basket, 6,986kcal, £7.18 | Seven Oceans ration 500g x3, 7,200kcal (Amazon), £26.97 | High energy biscuit tins 6-pack x2, 11,040kcal (Amazon), £63.98 | 3 routes |
| Torch | Energizer 90 Lumen Metal LED Torch (Argos), £9.99 | Luceco 1000 Lumen Rechargeable Hand Torch (Argos), £15.49 | Luceco 300lm Tilt Tripod Torch with Power Bank (Argos), £30.99 | 14 |
| Spare batteries | Sainsbury's Home AA x4, £3.70 | Sainsbury's Home Extra Long Life AA x8, £5.20 | Duracell Plus AA x12 (Sainsbury's), £9.00 | 8 |
| Battery or wind-up FM radio | Bush FM Portable Pocket Radio (Argos), £9.99 | iRonsnow IR-088 wind-up (Amazon), £20.99 | DIWUEO D-12 DAB+/FM wind-up (Amazon), £77.68 | 20 |
| Power bank | Juice 5000mAh (Argos), £14.99 | Juice MagTec 2 10000mAh wireless (Argos), £29.99 | Anker 87W 20,000mAh laptop power bank (Argos), £59.99 | 16 |
| First aid kit | General Medi Mini 92 pieces (Amazon), £7.22 | General Medi 170 pieces (Amazon), £14.99 | Lewis-Plast 309 pieces (Amazon), £38.37 | 13 |
| Hand sanitiser | Ineos Hand Sanitiser Gel 50ml (Sainsbury's), £1.25 | Carex Original 50ml (Sainsbury's), £1.50 | Carex Aloe Vera 300ml (Sainsbury's), £3.50 | 8 |
| Wet wipes | Little Ones Sensitive Baby Wipes x60 (Sainsbury's), £0.56 | Wet Ones Antibacterial Hand Wipes x12 (Sainsbury's), £1.00 | Huggies Pure Wipes 12 x 48 (Sainsbury's), £7.00 | 7 |
| Total, one person | £57.88 | £121.43 | £304.76 | |
| Total, household of four | £88.42 | £218.24 | £539.45 |
Household of four: water and food × 4; all other items once.
Differences
| Comparison | Absolute | Percentage |
|---|---|---|
| Mid-range minus budget (one person) | £63.55 | 109.8% |
| Premium minus mid-range | £183.33 | 151.0% |
| Premium minus budget | £246.88 | 426.5% (5.27 times) |
Working: £121.43 − £57.88 = £63.55; £63.55 ÷ £57.88 = 1.098. £304.76 − £121.43 = £183.33; ÷ £121.43 = 1.510. £304.76 − £57.88 = £246.88; ÷ £57.88 = 4.265.
What drives the cost
| Item | Budget | Mid-range | Premium |
|---|---|---|---|
| Power bank | £14.99 (25.9%) | £29.99 (24.7%) | £59.99 (19.7%) |
| Radio | £9.99 (17.3%) | £20.99 (17.3%) | £77.68 (25.5%) |
| Torch | £9.99 (17.3%) | £15.49 (12.8%) | £30.99 (10.2%) |
| First aid kit | £7.22 (12.5%) | £14.99 (12.3%) | £38.37 (12.6%) |
| Food | £7.18 (12.4%) | £26.97 (22.2%) | £63.98 (21.0%) |
| Spare batteries | £3.70 (6.4%) | £5.20 (4.3%) | £9.00 (3.0%) |
| Water | £3.00 (5.2%) | £5.30 (4.4%) | £14.25 (4.7%) |
| Hand sanitiser | £1.25 (2.2%) | £1.50 (1.2%) | £3.50 (1.1%) |
| Wet wipes | £0.56 (1.0%) | £1.00 (0.8%) | £7.00 (2.3%) |
The water and food Be Ready asks for are 17.6% of the budget kit. The kit's cost sits in the gadgets: power bank, radio and torch are 60.4% of it.
What the extra money buys
| Item | Budget to mid-range | Mid-range to premium |
|---|---|---|
| Water | Smaller bottles, easier to carry if you leave home | Premium brand; no extra water |
| Food | Long-life rations (2.5 to 4.5 years stated) instead of food you rotate | Bigger ration packs; the premium route gives 11,040kcal because tins come in 5,520kcal units |
| Torch | Rechargeable, 1,000 lumens | Tripod torch that doubles as a power bank |
| Radio | Crank, solar and a 2,000mAh battery; listing also sells a NOAA band that does not broadcast in the UK | DAB+, Bluetooth and a claimed 27,000mAh battery; 1.01kg |
| Power bank | Double the capacity (10,000mAh), wireless | Laptop-grade 20,000mAh, 87W |
| First aid kit | 170 pieces in a hard case | 309 pieces |
The budget kit already meets every priced line of the checklist. Upgrades buy convenience and capacity, not compliance.
Method
- Checklist. We used the Be Ready checklist at beready.campaign.gov.uk (read 23 October 2026) for one person for three days. Items with no shop price (cash, documents, written numbers, medication, blankets and warm clothing most homes already own) are excluded and listed below.
- Quantities. Water: 3 litres × 3 days = 9 litres. Food: three days at the 2,000kcal reference intake on UK food labels = 6,000kcal.
- Retailers and pools. Sainsbury's (water, food, hygiene, batteries), Argos (torch, power bank, battery radios) and Amazon UK (wind-up radios, first aid kits, rations), each read on 23 October 2026. Each pool is the retailer's first page of results for a fixed search, keeping products that meet a qualifying rule (see the methodology file). Amazon sponsored results are excluded. Colour variants count once, at the lowest price.
- Tiers. Budget = cheapest in the pool; mid-range = middle item (the cheaper middle item for an even pool); premium = dearest. Water is ranked on the cost of whole packs to reach 9 litres. Food uses three set routes: a Sainsbury's no-cook basket (budget), the cheapest UK-sold ration route (mid) and the dearest ration route in the pool (premium).
- What we did not do. No delivery charges, loyalty prices or multi-buy offers; no testing.
Limits
- Three retailers, first page of search results, one evening. Another day will give different extremes.
- Cheapest and dearest are sensitive to single products: the premium radio and power bank drive the premium total.
- The food tiers are set routes rather than a single pool, because no one retailer sells both supermarket food and rations.
- Some Amazon products are sold by third-party sellers with unfamiliar brands; prices change often.
- Baby, pet and medical items vary by household and are excluded.
Excluded items (no shop price, or most homes already own)
Cash, printed documents, written contacts and medication list, the 105 power cut number, Priority Services Register sign-up (free), medication, blankets and sleeping bags, warm clothing, baby products, pet food.
Changes
None. First edition, captured 23 October 2026.
Cite this index
Look Into (lookinto.co.uk), UK Be Ready Kit Cost Index 2026, prices captured at Sainsbury's, Argos and Amazon UK on 23 October 2026: following the government's Be Ready emergency checklist costs £57.88 per person at budget level, or £88.42 for a household of four.
Free to quote with a link to this page. The full data is available as a CSV download.
Sources
- Be Ready checklist (GOV.UK campaign), read 23 October 2026. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Cabinet Office press release, 22 October 2026.
- Sainsbury's, Argos and Amazon UK listings for all 101 pool members, read 23 October 2026 (source register).
What this index could not check
- Whether any product works as described.
- Best-before and manufacture dates.
- Prices at other retailers.
- Whether the Be Ready checklist PDF differs from the web checklist.
This page carries no affiliate links and no paid placements. Look Into earns nothing from any product named on it.