Last updated: 18 August 2026
By Stiv · Design, technology and personal finance
Sprive has sat on my phone alongside a Nationwide mortgage since October 2021, and I have been chipping away with regular overpayments through the app ever since. Nearly five years on, the rates below come off my own screen rather than a press release.
Which Sprive supermarkets pay, and what they actually pay.
This article contains affiliate or referral links. If you click through and sign up I may earn a commission or referral bonus at no extra cost to you. It does not affect my editorial view.
This is not financial advice. It is a record of what my own app showed on a stated date, written from personal use.
Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage.
Want to try Sprive yourself?
The current sign-up offer and the steps to claim it are kept up to date on our referral page.
When I tell people about Sprive, the first question is almost always the same. Which supermarkets actually give you cashback? It is a fair thing to ask, because the Sprive supermarkets list is where most people will earn anything at all. Buying a grocery gift card is the everyday way this app pays out, as I covered in my Sprive review and in the guide to reloadable cards and top-ups.
Groceries also happen to be the sweet spot, and that is worth explaining. A gift card is less forgiving than a credit card when something goes wrong. Paying directly by card can give you protection on a return that a gift card simply does not. On a big-ticket buy from a large retailer, that matters. On a weekly shop, it rarely does. Besides, if you ever do need to take something back, another gift card for the same shop is usually fine.
So below you get the list, the real rates, and an honest sum of what it is worth. Seven grocery brands showed up in my Shop tab on 16 August 2026, paying between 2% and 3% as standard. Crucially, every penny of it lands on your mortgage rather than in your current account. One caveat, though: offers change often, so always check your own app before you count on a number.
Section 01 / The list
Which Sprive supermarkets are on the list
Seven grocery brands sit in my Shop tab, under a heading Sprive labels "Instant-reward". These are the plain standard rates on 16 August 2026, taken from the "Everyday rewards" tab with Supercharge switched off.
| Supermarket | Standard rate | On a £120 shop |
|---|---|---|
| M&S | 3.0% | £3.60 |
| Sainsbury's | 2.5% | £3.00 |
| Tesco | 2.5% | £3.00 |
| ASDA | 2.5% | £3.00 |
| Waitrose | 2.0% | £2.40 |
| Iceland / The Food Warehouse | 2.0% | £2.40 |
| Farmfoods | 2.0% | £2.40 |
Always check your own app. Offers change often. Rates move by brand and by day, brands are added and dropped, and a promotional boost can lift your own figures above these. So treat this table as one snapshot rather than a price list.
One wrinkle worth naming. Sprive's own FAQ brand list includes Morrisons, yet Morrisons has never appeared in my app. Farmfoods does the opposite: it sits in my Shop tab, but the FAQ omits it.
Section 02 / Two different things
Boost and Supercharge are not the same thing
This bit is honestly quite confusing, and the two are very easy to muddle up, so I will do my best to explain. It matters, because one of them is money and the other is just maths. It also explains why the Sprive supermarkets rates on your screen probably will not match mine.
A boost changes what you earn
A boost is a promotional uplift on the cashback rate itself. You might get one for joining, from a referral like ours, or whenever Sprive runs a campaign. It carries an end date, and mine showed a banner reading "Boost ends on 20 Aug 2026". Crucially, a boost is real money: it lifts the percentage you actually earn on a gift card.
Helpfully, Sprive shows you the difference itself. The Shop tab has two views: "Everyday rewards", which gave the table above, and "Preview a boost", which shows what those same brands pay once a boost is applied. Here are the two side by side.
| Supermarket | Everyday rewards | Preview a boost | Uplift |
|---|---|---|---|
| M&S | 3.0% | 4.0% | +1.0 |
| Tesco | 2.5% | 3.5% | +1.0 |
| ASDA | 2.5% | 3.5% | +1.0 |
| Sainsbury's | 2.5% | 3.0% | +0.5 |
| Iceland / The Food Warehouse | 2.0% | 3.0% | +1.0 |
| Farmfoods | 2.0% | 3.0% | +1.0 |
| Waitrose | 2.0% | 2.5% | +0.5 |
So a boost adds between half a point and a full point, depending on the brand. That matches what I have seen across several boosts over nearly five years. However, boosts vary by campaign and by account, and the preview is Sprive's illustration rather than a guarantee. Check the tab in your own app for your own numbers.
Supercharge changes what you see
Supercharge is a display toggle, not an offer. Usefully, Sprive labels it honestly in the app itself: the switch reads "Supercharge rewards (incl. mortgage savings)". So when you turn it on, the app adds your projected mortgage interest savings on top of the cashback rate. The result is a combined figure covering the total benefit of a purchase, cashback plus the interest you avoid by overpaying.
Therefore Supercharge earns you nothing extra by itself. It simply reframes the same cashback as a bigger number.
What all three look like together
Follow M&S through all three states on my screen that day. Under "Everyday rewards" it paid 3.0%. Under "Preview a boost" it showed 4.0%, which is still real cashback. Switching Supercharge on displayed 7.80%, and that final jump was not cashback at all. It was Sprive's projection of the mortgage interest I would avoid by putting that money towards my balance.
Consequently the first two figures and the third are not comparable. One is money landing on your mortgage this month. The other is a forecast that depends on your rate, your balance and your remaining term. Change any of those and the Supercharge figure changes with it.
Supercharge is a lens, not an offer.
You can run both at once, and I was. Equally you can have Supercharge switched on with no boost at all. So the practical rule is simple: to see what you will actually earn, switch Supercharge off first.
Section 03 / The maths
What this is actually worth
Here is where I have to be blunt, because the percentages read bigger than they spend. A weekly shop of £120 at Tesco's standard 2.5% earns £3.00. Do that every single week for a year and you reach about £156.
That is not nothing. Still, it works out at roughly one takeaway a month. It also only arrives if you buy the gift card first, every time, without forgetting. Miss a few weeks and the figure drops accordingly.
A boost improves that, though not dramatically. At my boosted 3.5% the same Tesco shop returned £4.20, or about £218 across a year. Meanwhile Waitrose sits at 2.0% as standard, so a £120 shop gives £2.40. Against the faff of a gift card at the till, that is marginal. Switch Supercharge on and the same shop displays a far prettier number, but your bank balance does not notice the difference.
My honest read after nearly five years: treat it as a small, steady trim rather than a strategy. Bigger levers exist. Our guide on how to pay off a mortgage faster runs through the seven that move a term properly. If you want the rules instead, how mortgage overpayments work in the UK covers allowances and early repayment charges.
Section 04 / The catch
The money goes to your mortgage, not your bank
This is the single most misunderstood thing about the app, so I will say it plainly. Cashback earned in the Shop tab cannot be withdrawn as cash. It is set aside and then sent to your lender as a mortgage overpayment.
Sprive's own FAQ puts it flatly: "You can't withdraw money earned from shopping." Money set aside through the autosave feature behaves differently. Shopping cashback does not.
Therefore it only makes sense if you have a mortgage. It also only helps if overpaying is something you actively want to do. Otherwise a conventional cashback app suits you better. We compare the field in the best cashback apps in the UK. Meanwhile the mechanic itself is unpicked in how Sprive cashback works.
Section 05 / At the till
How you actually pay in the shop
You do not tap your normal card and get rewarded afterwards. Instead you buy a gift card for that supermarket inside the Shop tab, then pay with it. The cashback is calculated on the gift card purchase.
Sprive also offers a reloadable card per retailer. Once set up, it removes most of the friction. Mine sits in Apple Wallet, so paying means scanning a QR code rather than digging out a code.
Smart top-up versus auto top-up
Notably, the two automatic modes behave differently, and the difference matters.
Auto top-up reloads a fixed amount on a schedule, with no balance check. My Tesco card is set to £25, currently paused. Smart top-up checks first: my Sainsbury's card reloads £100 on Fridays, but only if the balance has fallen below £20. Minimums vary by retailer, so read the screen before you confirm.
Consequently auto top-up can quietly stack up money on a brand you rarely visit, whereas smart top-up cannot. If you set only one thing up, make it the smart version.
I have written that up properly in our guide to Sprive reloadable gift cards. Frankly, the difference between those two settings matters more than the headline rate.
Section 06 / The gaps
Aldi, Lidl and the ones that are missing
In nearly five years of using the app, I have never noticed Aldi, Lidl or Co-op in the Shop tab. None of the three appears on Sprive's published brand list either. On that basis they look unsupported, though I would not call it permanent. Brands do come and go as offers change, so check the app yourself rather than taking my word for it.
Meanwhile that gap matters more than it first looks. The Sprive supermarkets paying best, notably M&S, are rarely where people run a tight budget. Conversely the discounters pay nothing here at all. So the saving and the cashback pull in opposite directions.
Morrisons sits in an awkward middle. Sprive lists it publicly, yet it has never shown up in my own app. Consequently I am not putting a rate against it.
Section 07 / Fit
Who this suits, and who it does not
In my experience it works best under four conditions. First, you have a mortgage you want to clear early. Second, you shop mainly at Tesco, ASDA, Sainsbury's or M&S. Third, you will set up a reloadable card once. Finally, you are content to leave it running.
Equally, it works badly in the opposite cases. Aldi and Lidl shoppers get nothing. Anyone needing spendable cash gets nothing useful either. A tight overpayment allowance limits the benefit further. Above all, if a gift card at the till sounds like admin, skip it.
Neither list is a recommendation. Both are simply the shape of the thing after five years.
Section 08 / Regulation
Regulation and where your money sits
Sprive Limited (FRN 919863) is an appointed representative of two principals for mortgage services. Those are Connect IFA Ltd (FRN 441505) and New Leaf Distribution Limited (FRN 460421). You can check the firm's own record on the FCA Register.
Money held in the in-app wallet sits with PrePay Technologies Limited (FRN 900010). It is an authorised e-money institution. That money is safeguarded, not FSCS-protected. Those are different things. So the distinction is worth understanding before you park a balance there.
CoolCuration is not FCA authorised and does not give regulated advice. For impartial guidance on overpaying a mortgage, MoneyHelper is government-backed and free.
Sprive supermarkets: frequently asked questions
Does Sprive work with Aldi and Lidl?
Not as far as I can see. Neither discounter appears on Sprive's published brand list, and I have never noticed either in my own app. So if those are your main shops, there is currently no grocery cashback to earn here. Offers do change, though, so check the Shop tab yourself before ruling it out.
Does Sprive work with Tesco and Morrisons?
Tesco, yes: it paid 2.5% as standard on my screen, rising to 3.5% under the boost preview. Morrisons appears on Sprive's own FAQ brand list. However, it has never shown up in my own app. So I cannot quote a rate for it, and it is worth checking whether it appears in yours.
Can I get the cashback as cash instead?
No. Sprive states plainly that you cannot withdraw money earned from shopping. It goes to your lender as a mortgage overpayment instead, which is the whole point of the app.
Do the rates change?
Yes, frequently. Offers change often: rates vary by brand and by day, brands come and go, and a promotional boost lifts your rate temporarily for a stated window. So always check your own app rather than any table, including this one.
What is the difference between a boost and Supercharge?
A boost lifts the cashback percentage you actually earn, and it expires on a set date. You can compare the two in the app using the "Everyday rewards" and "Preview a boost" tabs. Supercharge is different: it is only a display toggle that adds your projected mortgage interest savings to the cashback figure, so the number looks bigger without earning you anything more. To see real cashback, switch Supercharge off.
Is there a limit on how much I can earn?
Your lender's annual overpayment allowance is the practical ceiling. Most fixed deals cap it at around 10% of the balance a year. So check your own mortgage terms first, because exceeding it can trigger an early repayment charge. We unpack those rules in our guide to mortgage overpayments.
Does it work with my lender?
Sprive supports most major UK lenders, though not every one. Mine is Nationwide, and it has worked throughout. Still, check your own lender inside the app during sign-up first.
Before you go
Rates, offers and terms change often. Everything above reflects one account on one stated day. Any Supercharge figure is a projection rather than cashback, and it varies with your own mortgage rate, balance and term. This article is not financial advice, and it does not account for your circumstances. So consider speaking to a qualified mortgage adviser before changing how you overpay.
This article contains affiliate or referral links. If you click through and sign up I may earn a commission or referral bonus at no extra cost to you. It does not affect my editorial view.
Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage.
More from CoolCuration
- Sprive prize draw: how the referral-based draws actually work, and who can enter.
- Mortgage overpayment calculator: see what an extra £50 a month does to your term.
- TopCashback referral code: the alternative if you want cashback you can actually spend.
- Airtime Rewards: passive cashback that needs no gift cards at the till.
- Gifts for foodies: for when the grocery budget turns into a present instead.
- Grubby recipes: our pick of the best meal-kit recipes worth cooking twice.
What's trending
Recent posts
- Which Supermarkets Does Sprive Support?
Seven supermarkets. Seven rates. One catch: the cashback never reaches your bank account, it goes straight at your mortgage. Here's exactly what Sprive pays at Tesco, ASDA, M&S and the rest, taken from my own app rather than a press release. - Best Meal Kits UK 2026: What We’d Actually Order This AutumnSeven recipe boxes, ranked for dark evenings and a suspiciously warm September. Real per-portion prices, the postcodes each one refuses to deliver to, and one genuine flaw per box. No sponsored placements.
- Pride National Theatre Review: A Five Star MusicalMiners and lesbians and gays, 1984, one scaffold set and a room full of people openly weeping. Pride at the National Theatre is the best night we have had in a theatre this year. Lewis Cornay's Bromley alone is worth the ticket. Cool Factor 5/5. #PrideMusical #NationalTheatre #LondonTheatre #LGSM #CoolFactor
No Comments.