Food storage times: fridge and freezer
Type a food and this lookup shows the refrigerator and freezer times FoodSafety.gov publishes for it, word for word. It carries every row of the agency's Cold Food Storage Chart, in the agency's own groups: salads, hot dogs and luncheon meat, bacon and sausage, ground and fresh meat, ham, poultry, fish, shellfish, eggs and egg dishes, soups and stews, and leftovers. Nothing you type leaves your browser.
What the chart is
FoodSafety.gov, the federal food safety portal run with USDA, FDA and CDC, publishes a Cold Food Storage Chart of how long foods keep in a refrigerator at 40°F (4°C) or below and a freezer at 0°F (-18°C) or below. The times assume the food was kept at those temperatures from the start.
Two things the agency says about its own numbers are worth repeating:
- The freezer times are about quality, not storage limits. The chart says food kept frozen at 0°F or below can be kept indefinitely; the months listed are how long it stays at its best.
- Some rows are not times at all. Raw eggs in the shell read "Do not freeze in shell. Beat yolks and whites together, then freeze."; live crab and lobster read "Not recommended"; egg, tuna and macaroni salads read "Does not freeze well". A few rows carry a note, such as "Yolks do not freeze well". The lookup passes those through as written rather than inventing a number.
This tool does not decide anything about the food in your kitchen. It has no idea how yours was handled, how long the bag sat in the car, or what the label says. Questions of that kind belong to the manufacturer and to the agencies above.
What the chart does not cover
The cold storage chart is about the fridge and the freezer, and about meat, poultry, fish, eggs and a handful of prepared foods. For the rest:
- Fruit and vegetables are a different chart. How to store produce sets out what the UC Postharvest Technology Center puts in the fridge, on the counter, and in the pantry.
- Cans and dry goods live at room temperature. Canned food shelf life covers the USDA figures for high-acid and low-acid cans.
- Date labels on the pack are a separate subject, and a coded date is not a storage time at all. Best before vs use by vs sell by explains the labels, and the Julian date converter reads day-of-year codes.
Using it with what you already have
A storage time is only useful if you know when the food arrived. Two of our printables do that job on paper: the freezer inventory sheet, where each bag gets a date as it goes in, and the pantry inventory list for the shelves. The fridge and freezer chart prints 34 of the 53 rows on a one-page PDF for the kitchen door, word for word: the salad, hot dog, luncheon meat, bacon, raw and cooked sausage, ground meat, steak, chop and roast rows, three ham rows, whole and cut poultry, fatty and lean fish, crab meat, lobster, shrimp and shucked shellfish, raw eggs, whites and yolks, hard-cooked eggs, opened liquid egg substitute, casseroles, pumpkin or pecan pie, quiche, soups and stews, and the three leftover rows. The whole chart does not fit on one page; the rest is here. Whether a food belongs in the freezer at all is a different question: can you freeze it covers the foods that come back limp, watery or mushy. For cooked food the answer is shorter and simpler: 3 to 4 days.
If food is being thrown away often enough to notice, the food waste calculator turns that into a yearly number, and food waste statistics gives the national figures.
Common questions
Where do these storage times come from?
From the FoodSafety.gov Cold Food Storage Chart, last reviewed 19 September 2023. The lookup reproduces the rows as published, including the wording where the chart gives advice instead of a time.
Why do the freezer times look short?
They are quality times. FoodSafety.gov says food held at 0°F (-18°C) or below can be kept indefinitely, and the months in the chart are how long it keeps its texture and flavour.
Does the chart tell me whether my food can be eaten?
No, and neither does this page. The chart describes foods kept at 40°F or below from the start. For anything about a particular food in your kitchen, the manufacturer and USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service are the places to ask.
Why is my food not in the list?
The chart covers meat, poultry, fish, shellfish and eggs, and a few prepared foods: salads, soups and stews, casseroles, pies, quiche and leftovers. Produce, cans, dry goods and drinks are elsewhere; the links above point to the right chart for each.
Is anything I type saved?
No. The lookup runs in the page, the search box never leaves your browser, and Duneed stores nothing from it. The only thing the page can share is a link you copy yourself.