10 Money Saving Hacks for Walgreens

Walgreens has been delivering on their promise to be your favorite neighborhood pharmacy since 1901.

But did you know there are numerous Walgreens hacks you could use to get the most out of the money you spend with them?

In this post, I am going to share with you 8 Walgreens hacks that you can use to save and make (you heard me: make) a lot of money.

Let’s get right into it.

Table of Contents
  1. Discounted & Free Photos Promo Codes
  2. Get the Walgreens App
  3. Paperless coupons
    1. How paperless coupons work
  4. Convenient Health Services
  5. Order medication refills
  6. Save on photo prints and enlargements
  7. Accumulate points when you buy
  8. Redeeming your points
  9. Earn points for making healthy choices
  10. AARP members Exclusive Perks

Discounted & Free Photos Promo Codes

Walgreens has a pretty solid offering of photo products, from actual printed photos to enlargements and mugs and other physical products. My favorite money saving hack for Walgreens is to wait for the freebies!

From time to time, they will offer steep discounts and even free photos, such as free 20 prints 4″x6″ or free 8″x10″ enlargement.

Right now, you can get a free 8″x10″ Photo Print for free when you use the coupon code FREE-8X10.

Select free pick up in the store when it’s available and it’s completely free.

Get the Walgreens App

This is where all your savings and perks will start.

If you don’t have it and yet you shop at Walgreens regularly, I highly recommend that you download it onto your smartphone right now.

It takes a few minutes and it will make a world of difference.

Paperless coupons

Love coupons?

In the early 2010’s, TLC’s Extreme Couponing opened many people’s eyes to the power of couponing in a brand new, albeit extreme, way.

You don’t have to buy 10 copies of the Sunday paper or dumpster dive for coupon books other people have thrown way.

It is time-consuming to sit down, look for and cut out all the coupons you would like to use.

Enter Walgreens paperless coupons.
If you wanted to take advantage of coupons without investing a ton of time in cutting them, this is the way to go.

How paperless coupons work

  1. You will first have to download the Walgreens app.
  2. Once you install the app and register an account, you can digitally “clip” coupons right within the app.
  3. When you go to the store to shop, buy your items like you regularly do. When you go to check out you will save money using your clipped coupons instantly if you use your Balance Rewards card or put in your number on the check out machine.

No cutting, paper or scissors will be involved in you saving hundreds of dollars each year at Walgreens with coupons.

Convenient Health Services

Did you know that you can access health services via the Walgreens App? You do now!

Using the Walgreens app you can chat with a Walgreens pharmacist about your prescriptions 24/7. No need to make a phone or wait for the next time to see a pharmacist.

Have a non-emergency but urgent healthcare need?

Using the app, you can locate a Walgreens clinic and make an appointment to get the care that you need.

Additionally, Walgreens has partnered with brands like Heal – a service that allows you to have a doctor visit your home – and MDLIVE – a service that allows you to talk with a doctor by phone or video.

Right within the app, you can access these services quickly and without hassle.

The healthcare services available to you through the Walgreens app will depend on your current location or a location you select.

And so beyond your own personal needs, if you needed a doctor from Heal, to go and pay your sick relative who lives in another state a visit, for example , you could do that from the
Walgreens app for a small fee – even if you or your relative does not have insurance.

From experience, I can assure you that the amount you will pay through the app is much cheaper than if you went to your local emergency room-with or without insurance.

Order medication refills

Time is money, right? So if we follow that logic, saving time will also save you money. Well, you can save a lot of time by ordering your refills through the Walgreens app.
And that is as easy as scanning your empty medication bottle.

Need to transfer your prescriptions from another pharmacy to Walgreens? All you need to do is take a picture of an old bottle that has the pharmacy name and the prescription number showing and just like that, you would have initiated a transfer of your prescription.

Walgreens will even fill your contact lens prescription if you need them to.

Save on photo prints and enlargements

Yes, you can order photo prints and enlargements from your Walgreens App.

As of this writing, you can save up to 30% off prints and enlargements. And yes, we are talking everything from your wallet prints to those gorgeous prints that come on canvas.

You can upload photos from your phone or social media into the app and have them printed and picked up the same day.

Accumulate points when you buy

Clipping coupons is not the only thing you can do with your Walgreens app. Walgreens has a program called Balance Rewards that you can sign up for either by picking up a card in-store or by signing up for it through the app. Within the Balance Rewards program, there is a system called the Everyday Points perk. With the Everyday Points Perk system, every $1 purchase you make on most items in-store amounts to 10 points.

Each month, the Balance Rewards program has promotions. For instance, in May of 2019, you could earn up to 10x points with a purchase as small as $20. In this case, instead of getting the regular 200 points for a $20 dollar purchase, you could earn 2000 points instead.

Redeeming your points

You can redeem your points by asking the cashier who rings up your purchase. 1000 points can be redeemed for $1.

Walgreens allows you to redeem up to 50,000 points at once – which is worth $50. If you are aggressive about accumulating points, you could very well end up buying a lot at Walgreens just with the points you’ve collected.

Using just the Everyday Points, you would need to spend $5000 to get 50,000 Balance Reward points. If you take advantage of those periods when points are multiplied, you will spend less. You can earn points even faster if you fill your prescriptions with Walgreens too.

And so all in all, the Balance Rewards Program is well worth your time and effort if you know you will be using Walgreens pharmacy services.

Things to note about the Balance Rewards Points Program:

  • Points expire one year after they are earned or six months after an account is inactive.
  • You can only earn a maximum of 50,000 points on prescriptions. There are no limits on other point earning opportunities unless it is specified in the promotion.
  • You can only redeem 50,000 points in one purchase. You can redeem up to 100,000 in one day.
  • Points can be redeemed on both online and offline purchases.

Earn points for making healthy choices

If you’re like me, then you like to be rewarded for working hard on your health. Walgreens makes it even better by allowing you to earn Balance Rewards points when you make healthy choices.

  • If you walk, run, cycle, perform a glucose test or perform a weigh-in and you log it into your the Balance Rewards section of your Walgreens app, you will earn 20 points per log.
  • If you link a health device or app, you can earn 250 points.

If you already perform these healthy activities, this is a plus. If you don’t, and you shop at Walgreens, this could be your incentive!

AARP members Exclusive Perks

Are you an AARP member? If you call 855-225-0400 to link your AARP card with your Walgreens Balance Reward card, you will receive exclusive benefits including:

  • 5X points on Walgreens brand products
  • 1.5X points on the healthy choices you make every day. So you would earn 30 points each time you log a healthy choice on your app.
  • 1000 points per vaccination. Note: You cannot earn these points if you live in Arkansas, New Jersey or New York.

As you can see, the opportunities to save money at Walgreens are impressive.

Have you tried any of these Walgreens hacks?

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  1. Amy says

    Good article. I just stumbled across their digital coupons Dec 21′ & managed to get over $50 cash rewards in that 1 month.. without spending any of my $. Not sure if the promotions are the same at all Walgreens- but heres how I did it.. clipped the digital coupon “spend $20, get $5 walg rewards” and used the paper coupon they gave me that comes out w/ receipt ‘spend $25, get $7 walg rewards”
    So when checking out, I hand them the paper coupon& the digital one goes thru on its own- & I leave w/ another $12 rewards. In December, I got the $5 digital coupon 4x & the $7 printed coupon 3x that month. Also, I have an EBT card& all purchases were for groceries. So I was able to get diapers& 2christmas gifts for free 🙂. Thought the coupons were bc of holidays, but Today, 1/1/22 i went& got another $12 rewards- & ANOTHER $7 coupon printed w/ my receipt. Whaat?!?

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