“Am I spending too much on groceries?” has an official answer, updated monthly, and almost nobody uses it.
USDA produces four food plans at successively higher cost levels — Thrifty, Low-Cost, Moderate-Cost, and Liberal — each describing a nutritious diet with all meals and snacks prepared at home, priced from average food costs and adjusted monthly for inflation using the Consumer Price Index. The Thrifty plan matters beyond budgeting: the reference family’s Thrifty cost is what sets the maximum SNAP allotment under the Food and Nutrition Act of 2008.
July 2026, USDA reference family
Figures from the USDA page updated August 26, 2026, for two adults aged 20–50 and two children aged 6–8 and 9–11.
| Plan | Weekly | Monthly |
|---|---|---|
| Thrifty | $236.50 | $1,024.90 |
| Low-Cost | $260.40 | $1,127.90 |
| Moderate-Cost | $321.00 | $1,391.10 |
| Liberal | $388.40 | $1,682.90 |
The Thrifty row is USDA’s published reference-family figure. The other three rows are the sum of USDA’s four individual lines for that family from the July 2026 “Cost of Food at Home at Three Levels” table (male 20–50, female 20–50, child 6–8, child 9–11). Individual lines used: Low-Cost $73.30, $63.70, $60.70, $62.70 weekly; Moderate $92.00, $77.80, $70.40, $80.80; Liberal $112.50, $99.30, $82.40, $94.20.
Your household is not the reference family
USDA publishes a per-person table by age and sex, and a household-size rule: the table costs are for people in 4-person households. For other sizes — 1 person, add 20%; 2 people, add 10%; 3 people, add 5%; 5 or 6 people, subtract 5%; 7 or more, subtract 10%. Sum the individuals first, then apply the adjustment.
Two limits on the number
It covers food at home only — restaurant meals are not in it. And Alaska and Hawaii run higher: the July 2026 Thrifty reference-family cost is $1,276.30 in Anchorage and $1,555.70 in Hawaii.
How to use it
Pull one month of grocery receipts, drop the non-food lines, and compare against your household’s adjusted figure. If you land above Liberal, the gap is not price inflation. It is the list. Start with “Shop Your Kitchen First” in this collection.