6 Best Meal Delivery Services 2024 UK; tried and tested
AFTER a busy day at work and a long commute home, the last thing you want to be doing is cooking a meal from scratch every evening. At the same time, the benefits of eating healthily are well-known and junk food every night just isn’t going to make you feel good.
There is another way though – meal delivery services.
Fresh ingredients delivered directly to your door, organic fruit and vegetable boxes, recipe kits full of everything you need to create a wholesome, health-giving meal – the best meal delivery services cover all of these options.
Plus, you don’t have to be an amazing chef to create amazing meals, as recipes and step-by-step instructions are usually provided, along with the exact amounts of individual ingredients required – so there’s no waste!
There’s a great selection of different dishes too, so whether you’re vegan, vegetarian, a confirmed carnivore or a curry fan, you’ll find something to suit your tastes.
All of this plus no need to go grocery shopping! It’s easy to see why meal delivery services have increased in popularity so much in recent years.
Best meal delivery services at a glance:
- Best overall meal delivery service: HelloFresh
- Best prepared meal delivery service: Lions Prep
- Best vegan meal delivery service: allplants
- Best budget meal delivery service: Gousto
- Best healthy meal delivery service: Mindful Chef
HelloFresh
- Hello Fresh, from £1.57 per serving (including 60% off) based on five recipes per week for four people – buy here
Pros: No need to shop or think of what to cook, lots of plan choice, variety of meal-kit options, seven-day delivery, easy cooking instructions, big discount on first box, delicious food, easy to cancel your subscription
Cons: Portions are only for two or more
Ratings: 5/5
One of the main benefits of Hello Fresh is that it frees up your time, as it plans out all your meals for you, making it ideal for busy schedules. We tested the meal delivery service and opted for the five meals a week for two plan, and the three meals a week for two plan. While Hello Fresh is best suited for shared households as meals can only be made for two or more, individuals can still order and save portions for meal prepping.
There are a variety of options, and we reviewed the vegetarian, pescatarian and meat diets, including low-calorie and quick recipes.
Hello Fresh allows you to choose your delivery day to suit your schedule and all of the meals are separated into different bags. Recipe cards for each meal are included in the box, with instructions, nutritional information and cooking times.
The instructions on the recipe card are simply laid out in layman’s terms, so even the most inept home chefs would struggle to get it wrong. Over the week, all of our meals turned out perfectly, even on the days we were tired and lacking focus.
One of the meals tested was the Creamy Patsa Primavera, and it was easy to make, took under 30 minutes had a large portion size for two, and was the perfect dinner after a long day. It also included ingredients we wouldn’t normally pick up from the grocery shop and we were pleasantly surprised with the variety of vegetables.
None of the cooking techniques ended up being too complex and we were left impressed with the meals we made, as they were a level above our usual home cooking. We found each of the meals in the kit delicious and unique. Our encounter with Hello Fresh was a wholly positive one, and we will be going back for more.
Read our full Hello Fresh review.
Get an extra 60% off your first box and 20% off for two months with Sun Vouchers code HFSUN60
Review by Jessica O’Donnell and Natalie Chui.
Delivery: Delivery cost unknown; Cost: from £1.57; Plans: for 2 – 4 people, with 2 – 5 recipes per week
Gousto
- Gousto recipe boxes, from £2.99 per serving based on four recipes per week for four people (currently get 60% off our first box and 20% off all other boxes in your first two months) – buy here
Pros: Great recipe variation, easy-to-follow recipes, all the ingredients are delivered straight to your door, get to do the fun parts of cooking without having to shop or plan, cancel at any time
Cons: Sometimes the recipe calls for basic ingredients most people will have in their fridge or pantry that aren’t included in the box, automatically signs you up for a subscription
Rating: 4.5/5
Gousto offers up to 75 dishes to select from each week and our tester found it simple to sign up and choose her selection – simply decide how many people, how many meals and choose the delivery date.
The kit selection includes plant-based, 10-minute meals, pescetarian and calorie-controlled dishes, among others.
Meals are delivered weekly, fortnightly or monthly and you can pause the subscription at any time.
Each meal in the box is in a numbered bag that corresponds to a numbered recipe card and cooking instructions are easy to follow. The variety in the meals impressed us and tasted far more expensive than the price would suggest and it felt like we were treating ourselves.
Although the meals we tried were simplistic, they never got boring and we really liked the variety in options and cuisines.
We tried Joe Wick’s Feel Good Fuel and thought they were a highlight for anyone looking to eat a little healthier as they were delicious and contained lots of nutritional value.
The recipe box contained everything we needed and was perfectly portioned for the recipes we were making, limiting food waste and letting you flex your chef muscles.
Read our full Gousto review.
Review by Jessica O’Donnell.
Delivery: £3.99; Cost: from £2.99; Plans: for 2 – 4 people, with 2 – 5 recipes per week
READ MORE
- Hello Fresh review
- Gousto review
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- Mindful Chef review
- Best soup maker
- allplants review
Mindful Chef
- Mindful Chef, from around £6. Currently offering £25% off your first four recipe boxes – buy here
Pros: Great-quality ingredients, interesting, seasonal and wide-ranging recipe selection that introduces you to new dishes and cuisines, portion for two ACTUALLY serves two, B-Corp certified
Cons: Expensive, even compared to other meal delivery services
Rating: 4.5/5
We’re an enthusiastic home chef but often struggle to find time to cook meals from scratch due to a busy schedule.
Impressively, we found the two-portion meals from Mindful Chef to be generous – meals for two actually fed two people – and the ingredients were of high quality.
Pretty much every recipe we were sent was extremely healthy, but none of them were boring.
There’s around 20 recipes to choose from each week, all making use of seasonal ingredients. Simply select the number of people (1 – 4) and 2 – 5 recipes.
The brand also sells a Ready To Go Range, which comprises microwaveable meals, smoothies, soups and snacks, with meals starting from £4.50.
While Mindful Chef is more expensive than other delivery services, even with any introductory offers, we found it worth the cost.
All the recipes are easy to follow, but feel imaginative, creative and healthy, and once the cooking and eating are done, you’re left full; this alone makes it better than anything else on the market.
Subscriptions can be paused or cancelled at any time.
Read our full Mindful Chef review.
Review by Kieran Ahuja.
Delivery: £2.99; Cost: from around £6; Plans: for 1 – 4 people, with 2 – 5 recipes per week
Fieldgoods
- Fieldgoods, from £2.25. Subscribe and save 20% – buy here
Pros: Fresh and tasty meals, easy to make, saves time, delicious desserts, long shelf life
Cons: Small portions, limited vegetarian options, pricey
Rating: 3.5 / 5
We loved that Fieldgoods offers a wide variety of tasty and nutritious recipes, with side dishes and desserts as well as main meals, all pre-prepared.
Ordering is simple – just go onto the Fieldgoods website and select your bundle – mini, regular or party – then select the recipes you’d like to order.
While there’s nothing too fancy in the offering, most dishes would take a long time to prep and cook if you were to make them at home, so it’s nice to be able to enjoy labour-intensive dishes without the effort.
The one downside is that there are limited vegetarian and vegan options to choose from, which means that if you’re veggie or vegan, it would be hard to find meals for more than a couple of nights.
Portions are for one or two and every meal has a label giving the name of the chef, a personal touch that our reviewer appreciated.
We were impressed by the flavour of the dishes and appreciated the small handwritten note to indicate which chef made the meal.
Another benefit is that most meals have a long shelf life, so you won’t have to worry about food going off as it could last for a good few months.
Main meals cost from £7.25 and the minimum order is three single meals, or two meals for two people.
Next-day delivery is free and meals take just minutes to cook in a microwave (though longer in an oven).
The best advantage of Fieldgoods is that it saves you time from cooking and is ideal for busy lifestyles. We enjoyed the ease of coming home after a long day of work and heating up tasty and nutritious meals.
Review by Natalie Chui.
Delivery: Free. UK nationwide Cost: From £2.25 per meal Plans: Mini bundle (2 – 3 meals for one or two people,Regular bundle (6 – 8 meals for one or two people) and Party Bundle (three courses for 10 people)
allplants
- allplants plant-based meal delivery service, from £3.50 (15% off first three orders) – buy here
Pros: Great meal variation, filling food quantity, no post-cooking clean up required, time-saving, delicious
Cons: Long cooking times, some meals were quite carb-heavy, started to miss cooking after a while
Rating: 4/5
Unlike many other meal delivery services, allplants delivers finished products that you don’t need to cook, just reheat in the oven or microwave.
We’ve been trying to incorporate more plant-based meals into our diet and ordered a variety of options for breakfast, dinner, sides and desserts.
With over 80 dishes to choose from, there’s a good selection and we enjoyed how easy it was to get home in the evening and simply put dinner in the oven to heat up, with all of the cooking already done.
Although the meals were tasty and convenient, after a while we started to feel a little lazy and we think a combination of allplants and home cooking would be the best idea.
We enjoyed the ease of just popping something in the oven but we also enjoy the process of cooking.
All main meals contain 2 of your 5 a day, as well as protein and iron, and all are nutritionally balanced.
Currently allplants is offering 15% off your first three orders when you subscribe and you can pause, skip or cancel your subscription at any time.
Read our full allplants review.
Review by Jessica O’Donnell.
Delivery: free on orders over £50; Cost: from £2.50; Plans: meals are available to serve 1 or 2
Lions Prep
- Lions Prep Meal Plan Service, from £4. Get 30% off your first week and 15% off second and third weeks – buy here
Pros: Taste great, balanced, healthy meals, sustainable packaging
Cons: Expensive
Rating: 4/5
Lions Prep offers ready-made meals that you simply heat in the microwave. We found that most of the meals were tasty and loved the convenience of having food ready to eat in a matter of minutes.
Nutritional information is provided for each meal and snack, which is handy if you’re counting calories, and you can tailor your plan around your dietary requirements and budget.
For our money, Lions Prep would work well for anyone who’s looking to closely track their calories, as the pre-made meals make it easy to calculate your intake.
We found the quality of the meals overall very good, but expensive – especially when compared to cooking from scratch. However, Lions Prep is great if you’re time-poor but you don’t want to sacrifice eating good quality food.
If you find yourself eating a lot of takeaways each week, Lions Prep might actually save you money and you’ll likely end up eating a much more balanced diet.
Food is delivered on Sunday or Wednesday and you can pause or cancel your subscription at any time.
Read our full Lions Prep review.
Review by Joel Watson
Delivery: £6. Free if you spend over £45 on the 3-day plan or £75 on the 5 and 6-day plans; Cost: from around £4; Plans: 3, 5 and 6-day meal plans
What is the best healthy meal delivery service?
It’s impossible to narrow down the huge choice of healthy delivery options available to just one – it all depends on the budget you have, your type of diet and what you’re hoping to achieve.
For vegans and vegetarians who want to expand their plant-based menus, allplants is an excellent choice. Allplants also offers breakfast pots, desserts and smoothies, as well as main courses and sides.
Even the most popular meal delivery services, like HelloFresh and Gousto, have low-calorie options that are major crowd pleasers, so if you want the option to combine both carb-loaded indulgent dinners and healthy recipes, they’re worth looking at.
What is the best meal delivery service for vegetarians?
If you’re looking for purely plant-based meals, allplants is a leader in vegan recipes.
That said, the vast majority of popular meal delivery services have an excellent range of vegetarian options.
Mindful Chef’s vegan boxes are also gluten-free, so they’re ideal if you have additional dietary requirements.
Which meal prep and delivery service is best in the UK?
If you’re judging by popularity and share of the market, Gousto and HelloFresh dominate in the meal delivery arena.
Both brands are excellent all-rounders if you’re looking to sample a delivery service for the first time – they offer a fantastic range of recipes, different price plans and the sort of service you’d expect from market leaders.
That said, newer services and smaller operations are slowly making waves in the industry, so it’s worth shopping around to find the best service for your needs.
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