On October 20, 2026, five weeks before Black Friday, the US and UK stores we track showed 1,688 supplements with a crossed-out "was" price. We checked each one against what the product actually sold for in the month before its current price appeared. In US stores, 49 of the 409 products we could judge were really cheaper. In UK stores it was 11 of 692.
How we checked
A crossed-out price only tells you what the store says the product used to cost. We record every product's price several times a day, so we can see what it actually cost. The rule:
- The reference price is the lowest price the product had in the 30 days before its current price started. A price has to appear on at least two different days to count, so a one-day glitch doesn't set the bar.
- Really cheaper means today's price is below that reference.
- Same price for a month: the price hasn't moved in more than 30 days, yet the "was" price is still shown. By then the sale price is simply the price.
- Not cheaper: in the 30 days before the current price started, the product sold for the same or less on at least two days.
- Not counted: we need our own price checks on at least 7 different days in those 30 days. New products, products that were out of stock and stores we added recently often fall short, and we'd rather leave them out than guess.
This is the rule the EU has applied to "was" prices since 2022. It isn't the legal test in the US or the UK; we use it because it's simple, and a store can only pass it by having actually charged more. We measure the price on the product page, so coupon codes and cart discounts aren't included. More on how we collect prices: how it works.
The results
US stores, 610 products with a crossed-out price:
- Really cheaper: 49, or 12% of the 409 we could judge
- Same price for over a month: 227
- Not cheaper: 133
- Not counted, too little price history: 201
UK stores, 1,078 products with a crossed-out price:
- Really cheaper: 11, or under 2% of the 692 we could judge
- Same price for over a month: 327
- Not cheaper: 354
- Not counted, too little price history: 386
The biggest group: "on sale" for over a month
In US stores, more than half of the products we could judge (227 of 409) had kept the same price for more than 30 days while still showing a crossed-out price. In UK stores it was 327 of 692. The typical claimed saving on these was 25% in the US and 33% in the UK (medians).
Some categories are mostly this. In US stores, 26 of the 38 creatine products with a crossed-out price, 21 of the 30 hydration products and 51 of the 98 pre-workouts had been at the same price for over a month. In UK stores it was 59 of 110 creatine products and 65 of 115 amino acid products.
Not cheaper than the month before
133 US products and 354 UK products were "on sale" at a price they had already sold at, or below, on at least two days in the previous 30. That is what a sale that switches on and off looks like, or a price that went up shortly before the discount. On these, stores claimed a median of 15% off in the US and 21% in the UK.
Where the real discounts were
The 49 real discounts in US stores were a median of 20% below the reference price, close to what the stores themselves claimed. Pre-workouts had the most (14), then vitamins (7), amino acids, fat burners and protein powder (6 each) and creatine (5). The biggest were two Nutricost products, NutriZen Focus and NutriZen Unwind: $8.39, against a lowest price of $27.97 in the month before, 70% less.
The 11 in UK stores were smaller: a median of 9% below the reference, while the stores claimed a median of 44% off on the same products. The biggest was Myvitamins Carb Metaboliser (90 capsules) at £6.99, against £19.49 in the month before: a real 64% drop, though the store's label says 73%.
What to do this Black Friday
- Ignore the crossed-out price. Look at what the product sold for in the last few weeks; our product pages show the full price history.
- Be wary of a sale that never ends. If a product has been "on sale" for a month, that's its price.
- Compare what you get, not the tub price. Cost per serving or per gram tells you more than a percentage off; our creatine dosage calculator works out how long a tub lasts and what it costs per day.
- Check our Black Friday page. It runs the same test on current prices and lists only the products that pass.