Last Updated on 21 January 2026 by Dan Wilderness
Hello everyone! The Waitrose supermarket recently made some updates to their loyalty programme MyWaitrose, adding in some great new perks like Little Treats to reward overall spend.
This article represents our latest 2026 view of what MyWaitrose does as a loyalty scheme, how to make the best use of the MyWaitrose vouchers and how to ensure you can always get a free coffee in store.
I’ll just note this scheme is now technically called My Waitrose rather than MyWaitrose. Whilst I may upset a Waitrose comms person with this I do see that as pretty inconsequential name change so for now you’ll continue to see MyWaitrose usually used below.
(Please note: Loyalty schemes change all the time so whilst everything is correct at time of writing, there is always potential for slight changes!)
The Quick Verdict on MyWaitrose
Whilst Waitrose is not the cheapest supermarket to shop at, the MyWaitrose loyalty scheme has continuously become a stronger proposition through it’s life. It offers some of the best of other schemes in offering rewards both for big overall spend (Little Treats) and small top-up shops (personalised vouchers).
Combined with a generous free daily coffee, absolutely worth using.
How did we test MyWaitrose?
Waitrose is my most local supermarket and whilst I do not shop there all the time, this has been based on my personal experiences of using MyWaitrose for all of big shops, small top up shops and simply grabbing a free coffee on a regular basis for many years.
What is MyWaitrose?
MyWaitrose is the loyalty scheme for the Waitrose Supermarket, and has been around for a while.
Initially the MyWaitrose benefits provided were very general – free coffee in store, offers on newspapers etc. Whilst the coffee offer has recently made a return (which we’re pleased about) the loyalty scheme more generally has evolved.
Specifically, MyWaitrose has turned into an approach based on personalised offers, paired with reward for an overall monthly in store spend.
What are the benefits of MyWaitrose?
Personalised MyWaitrose Vouchers targeted to you
Each week, MyWaitrose will send you personalised vouchers which are based on your shopping history.
This is the biggest aspect of the new MyWaitrose and probably offers the largest benefit to most people.
One of the key differences is that now you’re reliant on having Waitrose’s mobile phone app to get the most out of the programme – but it can be worth it.
On a weekly basis (they update on a Wednesday) you’ll need to select these within the MyWaitrose app. The offers I’ve seen have been pretty beneficial – I’m regularly getting £1/£2 off products which I would be buying anyhow, and I often make use of the vouchers because they’re so relevant to my shopping.
Update: You used to be able to select just a couple of vouchers – in a change to the scheme it now appears you can select all the vouchers that are offered to you, albeit you still have to opt in to them. This is even better and continues a series of upgrades Waitrose have been making to the scheme.
Little Treats at Overall Spends
A new feature introduced by MyWaitrose is now the Little Treats initiative, which rewards you for hitting various spending thresholds on your overall shop.
You’ll get a reward when spending £50, £100 and £250 spends.
You get a reward at each threshold – I.E you don’t have to chose between a £50 reward or saving up for the £100, you get both!
What can you get with Little Treats?
There is no specific item you get back with Little Treats – it’s entirely at Waitrose’s discretion.
At the time I’m writing this, Little Treats is still a fairly new scheme but what I’ve had back has represented good value, and seems to point to them particularly looking to promote seasonal ranges.
As some examples of what I’ve had so far:
- At a £50 little treat I’ve had a pot of Bonne Maman Jam, and some Christmassy Cinnamon Buiscuits.
- At a £100 little treat I’ve had some mince pies from the Waitrose No .1 range
- I have not spent enough in the month to earn a £250 little treat. (Readers, please do write in and let me know what you’ve had!)
How do I cash in a MyWaitrose Little Treat?
When you hit the spending threshold you’ll get a voucher which you can opt into in the MyWaitrose App, in exactly the same manner as the personalised vouchers. Simply select what you’ve been offered and then it’ll be deducted when you check out at the till.
Discounted offers on Product Ranges
Like many Supermarket loyalty schemes, MyWaitrose will apply occasional discounts to ranges of products, such as purchases from the fish counter or items from the Waitrose No.1 range. These change multiple times but can be beneficial – keep an eye out for them in store as they tend to be quite heavily advertised.
There are now a number of specific ongoing promotions run each day for the counter sections that seem to have become permanent MyWaitrose additions though, so we are highlighting them here.
All of these must be from the counter for the discount to apply (meaning you can’t get them in every store, only those with counters – any cheeses fish or meats from the freezer section won’t count for the promotion.
- Big Cheese Thursday gets 20% off purchases from a cheese counter on Thursday.
- Fish Friday gets 20% off all fish purchases on a Friday
- Sizzling Saturday gets 20% off all meat products on a Saturday.
If we’re being really picky, unless you have a Waitrose near you it’s slightly annoying having to come back each day if you want to do one weekly shop with anything, but these do work out as substantial price discounts and a good offer on Waitrose products.
Free Coffee every visit
Every time you shop at Waitrose you can now get a free coffee once per day as part of your benefits.
Since Waitrose re-introduced the coffee scheme, they’ve moved to using Cafe Nero beans as a crossover promotional initiative.
This is a particularly welcome benefit of the scheme and one of it’s most popular, as getting a coffee from Waitrose vs. purchasing one from a coffee shop can easily be a £4 per day save.
(Note: Nearly all Waitrose stores now have a requirement to scan your MyWaitrose card at the coffee machine to claim your free coffee – we’ve written a guide to getting your coffee below).
How do I claim my free MyWaitrose Coffee?
How to claim a free MyWaitrose Coffee
- Go to the coffee machine and place your cup under it
You’ll need a reusable cup with you and your MyWaitrose card.
- Scan your MyWaitrose barcode on the scanner next to the machine
This will register you’re using your MyWaitrose Coffee Benefit for the day.
- Select your drink on the screen of the coffee machine
If your card scan has successfully validated you can select your drink and it will start to dispense. Enjoy your coffee!
Simply head to the coffee machine and place your cup under it. You often need to scan your MyWaitrose card first on the little scanner next to the machine, then once done select the drink you would like on the coffee machine itself.
It sounds a bit fiddly, but it’s quite intuitive once you’ve done it a few times!
To take advantage, you’ll need to bring a reusable cup (no paper cups are provided in store anymore) and fill up at the coffee machine.
What are the rules in claiming a free Waitrose coffee?
Let’s just review the key rules that apply to the Waitrose free coffee scheme
You must be a member of MyWaitrose
Nearly every coffee machine is now set up to require you to scan your MyWaitrose Card to claim your free coffee – and under the terms of the scheme you must be a member to claim it.
You do not need to make a purchase to claim your coffee
The terms around free coffee at Waitrose has changed a few times, but at the moment it does not require any purchase in store to claim
(Note: The MyWaitrose Terms and Conditions do say some locations require a minimum spend but we’ve never actually encountered this being used in practice) – so simply go to the machine with your cup and scan your MyWaitrose card.
You must bring a reusable cup
Waitrose do not supply single use coffee cups at all – you’ll need to bring your own resuable cup (or buy one in store) for your free coffee.
You get one free coffee per day
The free coffee can be redeemed for one MyWaitrose card, once a day.
You must get the free coffee from a machine
Some branches of Waitrose also have an in-store cafe. For avoidance of doubt, the MyWaitrose daily free coffee only applies to coffee from a machine, rather than ordered from a cafe.
Excluded locations from MyWaitrose free coffee
For avoidance of doubt, you cannot use the free coffee offer at Waitrose branches which are part of a Shell petrol station, or a Welcome Break service station.
Free Waitrose Magazines
Waitrose have in-house magazines targeting food, drink and health and they’re usually pretty high quality – picking up these in store is free with a MyWaitrose card.
The monthly Waitrose Food magazine is particularly good and is a really excellent production.
Discounts on the Waitrose Cookery School/Dry Cleaning
A long tenured benefit is discounts on classes at the Waitrose Cookery School (10% off) and Johnson’s dry cleaning (5% off).
Discounts and free coffee via using your MyWaitrose card at Cafe Nero
More of a Cafe Nero benefit than a Waitrose one, but you can now link your MyWaitrose card to the Cafe Nero loyalty app.
The most immediate benefit of this is that you’ll get a free coffee at Cafe Nero via their loyalty app when linking. However you’ll also receive a further 25% any of the special seasonal menu and drink items at Cafe Nero as well, claimed automatically when you scan your Cafe Nero loyalty card.
You can find the option to link your MyWaitrose card in the “settings” menu within the Cafe Nero App.
How do I use the MyWaitrose Vouchers?
To use the MyWaitrose vouchers, before you shop (or at least before you get to the till) open the app and select the specific couple of vouchers you’d like to use by clicking choose this voucher.
Then when you scan your MyWaitrose card at the till, the vouchers will simply apply automatically – the discounts may not apply until you hit finish and pay, so don’t panic if you don’t immediately see them.
We’re really pleased to see Waitrose have responded to feedback on this – you used to have to individually scan each voucher as well to get the discount, which was a somewhat painful process.
What are examples of the vouchers I get with MyWaitrose?
As per the above, the vouchers change each week with MyWaitrose – but I have included here a list of the vouchers I’ve received for the week I’m writing this to provide an example of the type of offers you might get
- 50p off Waitrose No.1 Madagascan Vanilla Custard
- £1 off Waitrose Indian Tikka Masala
- 50p off Waitrose BBQ Chicken Stonebaked Pizza
- 50p off Waitrose Multigrain Farmhouse loaf
- 50p off Hellman’s Real Mayo
- 50p off 4 pints of Waitrose milk
- £1 off Waitrose Apple and Blackberry Crumble
- 50p off Waitrose Sweet Potato and Coconut Soup.
What’s obvious from looking at the coupons is that you’re far more likely to get coupons for Waitrose own-brand products than anything else.
Personally, I target the £1 options if it’s something I’m going to buy anyhow to try and maximise the benefit I get – failing that, staple items like milk or eggs are always particularly welcome discounts to have.
Overall Review of MyWaitrose
MyWaitrose has become a good scheme where some of the initial criticism on how it works has been improved. I’ve been in the happy position of being able to increase my star rating each time I’ve come back to it, as the team at Waitrose seem to have directly addressed the things I’ve called out as weaknesses.
The discounts themselves are very good, and have often been on essential items that I buy on a regular basis, meaning I’m actually making some good savings – particularly on premium goods like at the meat and fish counters where discounts are most substantial.
The free coffee benefit is also a nice hack to get you in store and if you use it every day can save you real money compared to a takeaway coffee – just remember to bring your own cup. Not requiring a purchase to make use of it is incredibly good value.
By adding Little Treats in, Waitrose has addressed the past criticism from us that whilst you were encouraged to do top-up shops via the vouchers, there was little benefit to big overall spend. However you’re now getting meaningful free items via Little Treats, which address this incentive gap well. We hope Waitrose do not dilute the benefits of these rewards down as Little Treats stops being new.
Our only final remaining criticism is that you need to proactively opt in for the vouchers in the app. This is admittedly a price of getting specific vouchers to you, so I’m not going to criticise too much for this, but we continue to hear that particularly slightly older customers don’t particularly like app based opt-ins.
I’ve elected to keep the review at the full 5 stars despite this as it’s become pretty inevitable in supermarket loyalty schemes – no-one really does much better.
Advantages
- Offers are personalised to you and tailored to your shopping history, so a good chance of getting something you need.
- Little Treats now reward overall spend meaningfully.
- Free Cafe Nero coffee is a nice perk.
- Good meat and fish discounts.
- Ability to choose vouchers gives you biggest advantage.
- Access to other in-store promotions.
Disadvantages
- Need to opt in for vouchers via app.
Troubleshooting issues with scanning a MyWaitrose card or vouchers
When it launched, MyWaitrose had a few problems with people finding difficulties in scanning their MyWaitrose card/vouchers at the tills – even staff were struggling!
It’s much better now in general, but I’ll just pass on one tip – under the credit card machine there’s an additional scanner which tends to pick up a scan from a phone much better than the till point one.
How does MyWaitrose compare to other Supermarket loyalty?
Owing to the discounts with MyWaitrose being on specific items, it offers really good discounts on them but doesn’t reward you for an overall shop. As such, it’ll compare very well to small shops but potentially not on a bigger one. We rate Tesco and Lidl as our higher performers on big shop spends in our comparison of UK Supermarket loyalty schemes.
And if you’d like to read about other supermarket loyalty schemes, we’ve got a review of Lidl Plus here, a review of Tesco Clubcard here, a review of Asda Rewards here, a review of Morrisons More here and a guide to if a Nectar card is worth it here!
And do check out our guide to the best loyalty cards and apps in the UK!
FAQ’s about MyWaitrose
I’m afraid not – this used to be a benefit of MyWaitrose when hitting a spend but has since been scrapped.
You do occasionally get a voucher for a newspaper in your weekly MyWaitrose offers – in my latest weeks batch I have had one for £1.50 off the Sunday Telegraph.
Yes, you’re limited to one per calendar day but there are no restrictions beyond that on how many you can claim in a particular time period, so you can go in every day if you wish.
No, you need need a reusable cup and to scan your MyWaitrose card. The T+C’s technically reference some stores needing a minimum purchase, but we’ve never seen it. Let us know if you have.
Yes, this is included in the MyWaitrose benefits – just scan it at the till with your shop and it’ll be deducted as you checkout.
Any questions?
Do you have any questions about the MyWaitrose loyalty scheme? We’d also love to hear your thoughts on your experiences and any big savings or issues – just leave a note in the comments below!
And that’s it!
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A number of additional comments:
1. The voucher bar codes (and probably the online MyWaitrose membership bar code) will not work if your phone screen is in dark mode, as it seems the bar codes become white on black, so you have to put the phone back to normal mode (which throws me back one screen on Samsung’s Android, so I have to call up my vouchers again). In contrast, Marks & Spencer Sparks barcode screen in the Sparks app works in either mode. .
2. The scheme is a little naff in that if you select a voucher and the product it was for is out of stock, you cannot cancel and select another voucher. For example I was being offered a high value voucher almost every week against guinea fowl – a product I did manage to get once at the start of this offering but then never managed to get again. After many weeks of this I was eventually told by a staff member that this item had ceased being stocked a matter of months before, but also that it does not matter anyway because all the vouchers work whatever you actually buy!
3. I seem to have been scuppered by all my vouchers now being mere 50p ones, whereas I have had some worth up to £3.50 in the past.
4. I get a free newspaper voucher for every day of the week, which is good value, but it used to be hard at the start (at least on the browser-based MyWaitrose hub) to navigate to the newspaper vouchers.
5.The MyWaitrose APP has a lot of bad press, but I have not had the problems people report there, as I use the hub via the browser.
6. In the branch I use most (Edgware Road, London), the main scanner on the till will not read the voucher barcodes from the phone, and I have to use the one beneath the credit/debit card machine, as you mention, whereas in the Bayswater store, the main scanners on the self-checkouts read them just fine, presumably because of the more modern machines there. [In contrast, the Edgware Road branch has hand-held Quick-Check scanners to scan your items, while the more modern Bayswater branch has never had them (and there is no choice but to use the QuickCheck app on the phone to scan your purchases if you want to self-scan – but that is irrelevant to this thread).]
I keep being informed that I’ll have to use my Waitrose card more often in order to earn vouchers. There’s a monthly regular debit going out to my mobile phone contract, and I’ve been using the card every week for, at least, the last month. Is there a minimum spend limit?
Hi Jeanett, thanks for reading and for reaching out.
My apologies if I’m being silly and misunderstanding you – from your reference to having a direct debit for a mobile phone contract I’m assuming you may have a Waitrose/John Lewis Partnership spending card? If that’s the case, it’s treated differently from the MyWaitrose Loyalty Card/app and using the spending card alone doesn’t get recognised by the MyWaitrose scheme even when spending on that – you’d also need to scan you MyWaitrose card at the till to qualify to start receiving vouchers.
If it is the credit/debit card – I’m afraid I’m not familiar enough with it to give any practical advice but I hope you get some vouchers one way or another soon! Sorry I can’t be more help.
I have just returned from waitrose after using my relatively new card. It was so difficult to scan the vouchers unlike the sparks card. Plus the sighing and eye rolling from the checkout operator was unacceptable. I know I’m order than her but really??
So much for ‘choosing’ from a selection of money off vouchers under the myWaitrose so-called Loyalty scheme! Having used this for a number of months and been able to choose 2 vouchers from a selection each week, I now find that Waitrose has decided to choose for me! There are only 2 pre-determined vouchers available to me this week. What’s more, one of them is for a product I bought last week and which is low turnover in my household so I really don’t want or need to buy it again this week. Why is Waitrose so bad at these things? Their algorithm is wrong!
Hi Elizabeth, thanks for reading and sorry to hear this. It does sound rather like an algorithm error as I’m not aware of any planned changes to the scheme, and I’ve just double checked mine and still have seven to pick from. We’d greatly appreciate hearing if this persists or if others have the same.
My vouchers have not appeared on my app for the last 3 weeks. It just tells me I have no vouchers to spend and to keep using my card. I do use it at least once a week! I have tried phoning and was told it would rectify itself as the system was being updated. I have tried ( twice ) by texting problems ( no reply ) customer services in store have been unable to help! Please advise!
Hi Cynthia, sorry to hear that – definitely incorrect, I’m still getting my vouchers here. I’m afraid I think customer services are giving you a fob off reason there and don’t really know what’s going on!
A couple of suggestions but I suspect you may have already tried – log off the account (found in top right of the account page on the app) and back in again, and if that doesn’t work, try removing the app from your phone and reinstalling that.
If that doesn’t work it’s definitely a Waitrose problem – but I’m afraid I don’t have an alternative beyond trying to persist with customer services here, sorry! Hope you get it sorted.
The exact same thing has been happening to me for the past 3 weeks. It has happened before and last time I was told I hadn’t shopped at Waitrose regularly enough. I shop there once a week.
Hi, I have the same problem, it frequently happens, I spoke to customer services and they said it could take four weeks! Infact I’ve now not had them for three weeks again and this is the third time this has happened! One even vanished the week before and I was going to use it! Useless scheme really…This reward scheme is so rubbish now, it used to be really good. I’d give them one star and that’s only because of the coffee! I frequently get pretty useless vouchers when they do send them.
This isn’t quite correct: some customers do get a voucher for a free copy of the Times and Sunday Times each day. I’m one of them. No idea why I do and others don’t but I do.