Power cut: how long the fridge and the freezer keep food

The fridge holds up to four hours, a full freezer about two days

Note the time the power goes off: every rule below counts from it. Keep both doors shut. FoodSafety.gov, the US government’s food-safety site, says a fridge keeps food safe for up to four hours, and a full freezer holds a safe temperature for about 48 hours, 24 if it’s half full and the door stays closed.¹ Britain’s Food Standards Agency gives the same three figures.³

Two things help before the next cut. A full freezer holds the cold longest, so the USDA suggests filling the gaps with frozen jugs of water, bags of ice or gel packs.² And a fridge thermometer turns guesswork into a reading: each agency’s rule is a temperature as well as a time.

Don’t taste anything to see whether it’s still fine: the US, Spanish and Australian agencies all warn against it.¹⁶⁸ When in doubt, FoodSafety.gov says, throw it out.

What to keep and what to bin

The four hours is the fridge without power. FoodSafety.gov’s chart works per food instead: it sorts what to keep once a food has been at 4 °C (40 °F) or above for more than two hours, which is what the thermometer tells you.¹

Cooking the perishables afterwards doesn’t rescue them: AESAN, Spain’s food safety agency, warns they can make you ill even cooked.⁶ In the freezer, FoodSafety.gov allows refreezing whatever still has ice crystals or is at 4 °C or below, though the quality may suffer; ice cream goes either way.¹

Where you live

The hours hardly change from one country to the next. The temperature line does, and so does the rule on refreezing, and those two decide what ends up in the bin. Go by the agency where you live.

Ireland’s food safety authority, the FSAI, gives no hours: if the fridge door stayed shut the food may still be safe, and if it was above 5 °C for a substantial time, it goes.⁹ Whether the garden counts as a fridge depends on the country too. Food Standards Scotland says chilled food can go outside when it’s 8 °C or lower, and the FSA adds a sealed box, dry and out of the sun;³⁴ Health Canada says not to put frozen food outside, even in winter.⁵

Two more, for readers further afield. Argentina’s food agencies, SENASA and ANMAT, print almost the American rule: the fridge keeps food cold for about 4 hours, the freezer for about 24 hours half full and 48 full, and perishable food that has been above 5 °C for 2 hours or more is thrown away.¹⁸ Austria’s interior ministry gives no hours at all. A freezer, it says, is built for cuts of a few minutes or hours, so the food you keep for a long power cut should mostly be the kind that needs no power.¹⁹

Eat what needs no heat, in the right order

Food normally kept at room temperature stays safe in a power cut, and tins can be eaten cold. The FSA’s order: what’s in the fridge, then anything defrosted that needs no cooking, then the perishable things from the worktop, and the tins, jars and dried food last.³

A freeze-dried pouch goes at the very end of that queue: Chicken & Rice keeps at least 12 months sealed, with no fridge. Most of ours can be made with cold water, 20–30 minutes depending on the meal. Meat and potato stay a little firmer that way than with hot water, and a little liquid may be left at the bottom.

Cold water or hot only, pouch by pouch

Pouch	Net weight	Water	Cold water
Chicken & RiceLarge	200 g	370 ml	about 20 min
Lentil & Vegetable StewLarge	200 g	490 ml	about 30 min
Porridge & Fruit	90 g	250 ml	about 20 min
Porcini Mushroom RisottoLarge	200 g	490 ml	Hot water only

Cold water or hot only, pouch by pouch

• Chicken & RiceLarge

  Net weight

  200 g

  Water

  370 ml

  Cold water

  about 20 min

• Lentil & Vegetable StewLarge

  Net weight

  200 g

  Water

  490 ml

  Cold water

  about 30 min

• Porridge & Fruit

  Net weight

  90 g

  Water

  250 ml

  Cold water

  about 20 min

• Porcini Mushroom RisottoLarge

  Net weight

  200 g

  Water

  490 ml

  Cold water

  Hot water only

Chicken & Rice takes 370 ml and about 20 minutes with cold water. Porcini Mushroom Risotto is hot water only, and so is Puchero Broth; the dishes that need the kettle are listed in freeze-dried meals with cold water. Once the water is in, we treat it as prepared food, and AESAN gives cooked food two hours at room temperature at most, so make it up when you’re ready to eat.¹⁰

Heat is the harder part. Don’t use a barbecue or a camping stove indoors, says the NHS, which also counts portable generators among the sources of carbon monoxide;¹¹ what each authority allows you to cook on is set out in how to cook without power.

From our range

72-Hour Food Reserve

9 pouches for 3 days, and no fridge needed.

€112.90Hear from us before the shop opensSee the box

One drawer for the next power cut

A cut that runs into the evening needs light, news and water before it needs food. Most of that fits in one kitchen drawer.

Three days need more than a drawer, mostly water, medicines and documents, and the 72-hour kit list sets it out item by item.

28 April 2025: the clock in a real cut

At 12:33 that Monday, mainland Spain and Portugal lost power.¹³ By 07:00 the next morning 99.95% of demand on the mainland was back, according to Spain’s competition regulator, the CNMC: a few hours or about 18½, depending on where you lived.¹⁴

Run AESAN’s rules over the longest of those cuts. A fridge that went off at 12:33 passed its four hours at 16:33, so by morning the meat, fish, milk and leftovers had to go. A full freezer with the door kept shut was still inside the agency’s 24–48 hours when the power came back.⁶ Andalusia’s 112 emergency service drew a stricter line that day: anything that had been above 4 °C for more than two hours went.¹⁵

Over the next two days the CIS, Spain’s state polling institute, asked 1,752 people what they’d missed at home.¹⁶

Missed something at home during the blackout¹⁶

41.6%

Of those, a way to cook without electricity¹⁶

34.9%

Of those, food that needs no cooking¹⁶

5.4%

After a way to cook came a radio (15.5%), torches or candles (10.0%), batteries (8.1%) and water (7.3%).¹⁶ Food that needs no cooking came well down the list: people had food in the house and no safe way to heat it.