Aldi has overtaken Waitrose to become the UK's sixth biggest supermarket.

The budget supermarket, which has recorded double-digit sales growth for the past four years, now has 5.3 per cent of the country's spend on groceries, according to Kantar Worldpanel.

Waitrose is still in growth – in fact just one of three to see sales rise ahead of the market – but nudged up 2.9 per cent for the 12 weeks to March 29, compared with Aldi's 16.8 per cent rise.

The premium supermarket, which has grown consistently since March 2009, took 5.1 per cent of total spend in the quarter. Lidl climbed 12.1 per cent, giving it a 3.7 per cent share of the market.

Aldi will now have its sights set on The Co-Operative, which took six per cent of the sector after sales declined by 1.7 per cent.

Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar Worldpanel, said: “Growth has been fuelled by over half a million new shoppers choosing to visit Aldi this year and average basket sizes increasing by 7 per cent. The German discounter’s sales have increased by 16.8 per cent in the latest period, still high compared to other retailers but slower relative to its recent performance.”

Tesco was in growth, albeit below the sector average, with sales up 0.3 per cent. Sales at Asda fell by 1.1 per cent.

Sainsbury's managed to rebound from declines stretching back to last August, growing a marginal 0.2 per cent, while Morrisons dropped 0.7 per cent.

McKevitt added: “The changing structure of Britain’s supermarket landscape is illustrated by two facts. Firstly, the so called discounters Aldi and Lidl now command a combined nine per cent share of the market. In 2012 the same two retailers only accounted for 5.4% of grocery sales.

“Secondly, the 72.8 per cent share taken by the biggest four retailers is now at the lowest level in a decade."