Magnum v eight supermarket options - does the nation's favourite come out on top?

It has been voted the nation's favourite ice cream, but with pack sizes shrinking and prices increasing, the Money team tested whether there was a supermarket dupe for Magnums with a better price-for-flavour payoff.

What we found was surprising. Not only were Magnums among the smallest ice creams, but they also had one of the lowest percentages of chocolate.

The brand's owner, Unilever, reduced the size of the ice creams from 110ml to 100ml in 2022 in a bid to mitigate operating costs. At the time, the standard pack size was four sticks.

A year later, it cut the pack sizes to three ice creams, saying: "There are a few other things you can be sure of with Magnum - that we use the highest-quality ingredients to make our ice cream, and that we believe everyone deserves moments of pleasure and indulgence. This won't ever change.​

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"But one thing has changed. The price of our ingredients. And that's why we've had to make some changes to our ice cream packs. To give all our pleasure seekers a pack size that suits their needs and budget you will now find your favourite Magnum flavours available in either three stick or six stick packs."

The milk chocolate used for the outer layer is only 28% chocolate - UK regulations require a minimum of 20% for a product to be classed as chocolate.

We were surprised to find that many cheaper alternatives had a higher chocolate content, bigger ice creams and larger pack sizes.

Having tasted them blind (we literally blindfolded our testers so they couldn't tell what brand they were tasting), we gave Magnum a score of 8/10.

Our testers enjoyed the sweetness and crunch of the chocolate and thought the ice cream was thick and silky, but it lost points for a slightly bitter aftertaste.

While it wasn't a poor score, the top spot was won by Lidl's larger 120ml ice creams with 30% chocolate that cost £3.19 for six sticks.

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Scoring 9/10, the chocolate held its crunch well, with the vanilla ice cream offering a great balance against its sweet creaminess.

This budget brand worked out at roughly 53p per ice cream. The lowest price we could find Magnums for (£2 at Morrisons) cost 66p each.

A close second place was handed to M&S with a score of 8.5.

It had one of the higher chocolate contents at 30% and used natural vanilla flavouring and ground vanilla pod in its ice cream.

It was slightly more expensive than some of the other options, costing £2.40 for three 110ml ice creams (80p each).

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(c) Sky News 2026: Magnum v eight supermarket options - does the nation's favourite come out on top?