Pricele #46: Milk (1 litre) in New Zealand 🇳🇿
The puzzle for 15 August 2026 asked what a litre of milk costs in New Zealand. Here is the answer and the context behind it.
The answer
Milk (1 litre) · New Zealand
$1.85
3.15 NZD
About 5 minutes of the average local wage buys a litre of milk.
More expensive than 84% of the 32 countries in the game.
Source: Numbeo (crowd-sourced), retrieved 2026-08.
About milk
Milk is heavy, perishable and awkward to ship, so it is almost always produced close to where it is drunk. That makes its price a read on local farming costs rather than world markets, and in much of the EU on agricultural subsidies, which push retail prices below what production alone would imply.
Where New Zealand sits
Of the 32 countries priced for milk, New Zealand ranks #6 from the top at $1.85, 1.2× the median of $1.54.
New Zealand exports most of what it farms, so domestic dairy prices track world markets rather than local production costs, which is why milk is not as cheap as a country of that many cows might suggest. Groceries generally run above Australian levels. Its GST is the purest in the table: 15% on essentially everything, with no food exemption at all, a design economists often hold up as the textbook version of a consumption tax. Comparing New Zealand with Australia is therefore unusually clean: similar economies and supply chains, but one exempts basic food from GST and the other does not.
| Nearby on the milk table | USD | Local | Work time |
|---|---|---|---|
| China | $1.79 | 12.12 CNY | 20 min |
| Thailand | $1.79 | 59.87 THB | 31 min |
| New Zealand | $1.85 | 3.15 NZD | 5 min |
| South Korea | $2.02 | 2,905 KRW | 9 min |
| Canada | $2.22 | 3.11 CAD | 6 min |
What else costs what in New Zealand
| Item | USD | Local | Work time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Big Mac | $4.94 | 8.6 NZD | 13 min |
| Coca-Cola (330ml can) | $2.22 | 3.8 NZD | 6 min |
| Cappuccino | $3.45 | 5.87 NZD | 9 min |
| Eggs (dozen) | $6.31 | 10.74 NZD | 17 min |
| Apples (1 kg) | $2.87 | 4.88 NZD | 8 min |
| Gasoline (1 litre) | $1.75 | 2.98 NZD | 5 min |
| Diesel (1 litre) | $1.59 | 2.71 NZD | 4 min |
| Electricity (100 kWh) | $22.30 | 38 NZD | 61 min |
| Natural gas (100 kWh) | $9.80 | 16.7 NZD | 27 min |
| Cigarettes (20-pack) | $22.75 | 38.5 NZD | 62 min |
| Beer (330ml) | $1.16 | 1.96 NZD | 3 min |
| Spirits (750ml bottle) | $69.64 | 117.85 NZD | 3.2 h |
| Vape e-liquid (1 ml) | $12.66 | 21.43 NZD | 35 min |
| Mobile data (1 GB) | $5.89 | — | 16 min |
| A day's healthy diet | $3.24 | 5.58 NZD | 9 min |
Go deeper
See the full table for milk in every country or everything priced in New Zealand.