Aldi vs Lidl Whisky: Which Discounter Does It Better?

Aldi and Lidl run almost identical playbooks: small range, own-label single malts, eye-catching prices, occasional Whisky-Awards medal sticker on the front. If you walk into either store you'll find a Speyside single malt for under £20 and a blended Scotch for under £15. The question this guide answers is: when you've got £20 in your pocket and a choice of either, which one do you actually buy?

We've reviewed every bottle in Aldi's range (8 bottles, blind-tasted) and the full Lidl line-up (5 bottles, same approach). This piece compares them directly. No fabricated tasting notes — every claim below is grounded in those two reviews.

The one-line version

Aldi: Wider range, slightly more polished single malts, the Glen Marnoch Sherry Cask is the standout. Best for: someone who wants a single malt at £18.

Lidl: Tighter range, the Islay-style Ben Bracken is the surprise pick, and the £14.49 Queen Margot 8 blend is the cheapest drinkable Scotch we've found anywhere. Best for: someone who wants a peat-forward dram at supermarket prices.

Neither wins outright. Buy from whichever is closer to you.

The blended Scotches — Lidl edges it

The entry-level blend in each discounter is the bottle most people pick up first — it's where the price-pressure lives, and where supermarkets win or lose new whisky drinkers.

	Aldi Highland Black 8	Lidl Queen Margot 8
Price	£13.99	£14.49
ABV	40%	40%
Age statement	8 years	8 years
Awards	IWSC Gold (multiple years)	IWSC Gold
Our verdict	Clean, polite, slightly thin	Slightly more body, decent finish

Both are competent. Both have won blind-tasted golds at the International Wine & Spirit Competition. Both are comfortable cocktail and highball whiskies. Lidl's Queen Margot has marginally more body and a slightly longer finish — the kind of difference you only notice tasting them side-by-side, but in that comparison Queen Margot wins. Aldi's Highland Black is the cheapest of the two and is the one to buy if you want a Scotch that disappears reliably into ginger ale.

Verdict: Lidl by half a length. Both are remarkable for their price.

The single malts — Aldi wins

The single-malt own-label is where the discounter category gets interesting. Both Aldi (the Glen Marnoch range) and Lidl (Ben Bracken) source from contract distilleries and bottle under their own brand. The result is a £17–20 single malt that has no business being that price.

	Aldi Glen Marnoch Speyside	Aldi Glen Marnoch Sherry Cask	Lidl Ben Bracken Speyside	Lidl Ben Bracken Islay
Price	£17.99	£17.99	£17.99	£19.99
ABV	40%	40%	40%	40%
Style	Classic Speyside	Sherry-cask Speyside	Classic Speyside	Islay-style peated
Our score	3.5/5	3.8/5 ← cluster MVP	3.4/5	3.6/5

The single best £18-or-under single malt we found across either discounter is Aldi's Glen Marnoch Sherry Cask — proper sherry-cask weight, dried fruit, a touch of nuttiness, a finish that holds. It's the bottle to take to a tasting if you want to embarrass someone's £40 sherried Speyside.

Lidl's Ben Bracken Islay is the most interesting bottle in either range though, and it's the one Aldi can't match: a peated, Islay-style single malt for £19.99. It's not Lagavulin and it doesn't try to be — but for under £20, smoke this approachable is genuinely rare.

Verdict: Aldi wins on the sherry-cask single malt; Lidl wins on the peated option. If you only buy one bottle: Aldi Glen Marnoch Sherry Cask.

Range breadth — Aldi has more shelves

	Aldi	Lidl
Blended Scotch	2 (Highland Black 8, Highland Black + occasional Glen Orrin)	1 (Queen Margot 8)
Speyside single malt	1 (Glen Marnoch)	1 (Ben Bracken Speyside)
Sherry-cask single malt	1 (Glen Marnoch Sherry Cask)	—
Highland single malt	Occasional rotation	—
Islay-style single malt	—	1 (Ben Bracken Islay)
Other ranges	Specially Selected single-cask releases at Christmas; occasional Japanese, Irish, American on rotation	Special-release Ben Bracken cask-strength bottlings appear sporadically
Range size (typical)	6-8 bottles year-round	4-5 bottles year-round

If you want choice, Aldi has a deeper shelf. If you want a single thing-that-Lidl-does-and-Aldi-doesn't, it's the peated Ben Bracken Islay.

Pricing — they're within pennies

Both discounters are pricing to the same shelf-level. The difference between them on any given bottle is rarely more than £1, and the relative rank can flip between weeks (yellow-sticker reductions, multi-buys, the various 25%-off events Lidl runs).

For the price-per-unit-of-alcohol view of either range, plug a bottle into our whisky value calculator — both discounters routinely deliver £/unit numbers that beat almost everything at £25–35 in the mainstream supermarkets.

Awards — they both medal in blind tastings

This is the bit the snobs hate. Both Aldi and Lidl whiskies have repeatedly won golds at the International Wine & Spirit Competition (IWSC), the International Spirits Challenge (ISC), and the Scotch Whisky Masters — all judged blind by professional panels. The awards aren't marketing inventions; they're earned in blind tastings against named-brand single malts.

A short list of the medal-winners (not exhaustive — both ranges medal in most years):

• Aldi Highland Black 8 — IWSC Gold, Scotch Whisky Masters Gold (multiple years)
• Aldi Glen Marnoch Sherry Cask — multiple medals at IWSC and ISC
• Lidl Queen Margot 8 — IWSC Gold (2023)
• Lidl Ben Bracken Speyside — IWSC Silver

Translation: the gap between £18 supermarket single malt and £40 named-brand single malt is much narrower than the supermarket aisles want you to believe.

Where they actually come from

Neither Aldi nor Lidl publishes the source distilleries for their own-label whiskies (contractual restriction with the contract distilleries). The whisky industry's worst-kept secrets:

• Glen Marnoch range — widely understood to be sourced from Tomatin (Highland) and either Glen Moray or Tamnavulin (Speyside). Cask-finishing done at the bottling plant.
• Highland Black 8 — blended Scotch using grain whisky from Cameronbridge or Strathclyde grain distilleries and malt whisky from across Speyside.
• Ben Bracken Speyside — Speyside contract distillery, likely Glen Moray or a similar mid-size operation.
• Ben Bracken Islay — sourced from an Islay distillery (most likely candidates from public clues: Bunnahabhain or Caol Ila, but neither is confirmed).
• Queen Margot 8 — sourced from multiple distilleries, blended for Lidl by a third-party bottler.

This is the open secret of the supermarket whisky aisle: most "own-label" whisky comes from the same handful of working distilleries that supply the named brands. You're paying for the spirit, not the marketing.

My honest verdict

If you only ever buy one supermarket whisky: Aldi Glen Marnoch Sherry Cask at £17.99. Best single bottle either discounter sells.

If you want something that doesn't taste like the £40 single malt next to it: Lidl Ben Bracken Islay at £19.99. Peated, distinctive, the bottle in this category that surprises people.

If you just want something to drink with ginger ale or in a hot toddy: Aldi Highland Black 8 (£13.99) or Lidl Queen Margot 8 (£14.49). Both fine. Buy the cheaper one.

If you want choice on the shelf: Aldi. Deeper range, more rotation, more chance of finding a Christmas single-cask special.

The honest summary: this isn't a case where one discounter is significantly better than the other. They're running the same playbook against the same audience with the same suppliers. The differences are at the margin. Buy from whichever store is closer to you, and use the £20 you save vs named-brand single malts on a bottle that's genuinely worth the markup (Highland Park 12, Aberlour 12, Tamdhu 12) for when you're drinking it neat.

For more on the wider supermarket whisky landscape, see our best supermarket whisky deals guide and our explainer on what actually happens inside supermarket whisky.