The £55m warehouse has opened near junction 2 of the M271.

The new Southampton warehouse is the 10th centre launched by the German retailer.

Last November the firm announced it planned to invest £1.5bn in the UK over three years in a bid to bolster the number of warehouses and stores.

The depot will service Lidl's outlets in an area from Brighton to Poole, Dorset and up to Newbury in Berkshire.

Marco Ivone, regional director at Lidl UK, said the company would continue to invest in the south of England as it rolls out its expansion plans.

Earlier this year, Lidl said it would relocate warehouses in Weston-Super-Mare in Somerset and Livingston in West Lothian, Scotland, to Bristol and Scotland's Eurocentral respectively.

It is also opening two new warehouses in Wednesbury in the West Midlands and Exeter, in Devon, while expanding its regional distribution centres in Newton Aycliffe, in County Durham, and Runcorn, in Cheshire.

Lidl sales grew by 8.4% and its market share rose to 4.6%, according to the latest Kantar Worldpanel figures published in October.