How long doBaby carrotslast in the fridge?

Freezing changes the unit, not just the number

Freezing does not just add time to this item, it changes the unit the answer is written in: 4 weeks in the sealed fridge against 3 months in the freezer, 3.2 times longer, months in place of weeks.

Every storage figure the USDA publishes for this item

All three places the USDA recognizes are rated here — pantry, refrigerator and freezer — which only 65 of the 466 foods in the data manage. Within Produce it is filed under Fresh Vegetables.

• In the freezer3 months
• Unopened · in the pantry4 days
• Unopened · in the fridge4 weeks

What the USDA adds in words

The USDA attaches 2 handling notes to this item, reproduced below word for word. None of them is a storage time: they qualify the figures above rather than replacing them. These are the source's own sentences, not ours, and they are the part of the FoodKeeper record that a table of durations cannot carry.

In the freezer. Blanch before freezing.

In the pantry. below 75 °F

Turning the range into a date

The window here is 4 weeks, short enough that the day it went in is worth writing down. Each clock has its own field: a figure counted from the day of purchase cannot be counted from the day you opened it.

• In the freezerUse by3 months after the day you stored it
• Unopened · in the pantryUse by4 days after the day you bought it
• Unopened · in the fridgeUse by4 weeks after the day you bought it

Is this window about safety or about taste?

The answer at the top of this page reads 4 weeks in the fridge. What decides that is the food and not the shelf the source files it on: Baby carrots is raw and whole. Past it, judge it by look and smell: this window rates how good the food will be, not the day it becomes a hazard.

Held at 0 °F food stays safe for as long as it stays frozen, which is why a freezer figure counts as quality on this site whatever the food is. Every figure assumes the food was sound when you stored it, that your refrigerator holds 40 °F or below and your freezer 0 °F or below, and that the package was handled normally.

It is past the date. Now what?

Say the calculator above puts Baby carrots past its 4 weeks in the fridge window. Past that the calendar stops deciding and the food itself does. Mold, a slimy or sticky surface, soft or darkened spots, or a sour smell mean it goes out whatever the date says.

The FoodKeeper entry this page is built from prints storage times and nothing else, so anything past them here is USDA and FSIS guidance rather than a figure from the source. The whole rule, including the cases the source does not cover, is set out under what to do when the date has passed.

Two places, and one of them is the wrong one

The USDA rates two places for Baby carrots in one state and they disagree: 4 weeks in the fridge against 4 days in the pantry. This page answers with the refrigerator, the longer of the two. Both figures are the USDA's own, so this is a choice of where to put the food rather than a disagreement about how long it keeps.

Is that a long time?

Among the 89 items the USDA files under Produce, this item ranks 13 by how long it keeps outside the freezer. Apples holds 6 weeks, Citrus fruit, lemon, lime, orange, grapefruit, tangerines, clementines holds 21 days. Among the 340 foods the USDA also gives a refrigerator figure, it keeps longer than 70% of them.

Items that behave the same way

The 6 items nearest it sit inside a band of 21 days to 3 weeks — a tight cluster, and this item at 4 weeks is inside it.

• Citrus fruit, lemon, lime, orange, grapefruit, tangerines, clementineskeeps 10 days sealed in the pantry
• Coconuts, freshkeeps 2 weeks sealed in the fridge
• Carrots, parsnipskeeps 2 weeks sealed in the fridge
• Ginger rootkeeps 2 weeks sealed in the fridge
• Kumquatskeeps 3 weeks in the fridge
• Yams/sweet potatoeskeeps 2 weeks sealed in the pantry

Products the USDA rates in the same places

10 other products are rated in exactly these places — freezer, pantry from the day of purchase and refrigerator from the day of purchase — out of the 466 in the file, so this is an uncommon shape of record. The nearest of them by keeping time are Cantaloupe, Apples and Grapes. They are listed below with their own answers, closest first, which is why this list differs from the one on their pages. Of the 8 shown, 3 keep longer than this one. The longest-keeping of them is Tamarind at 6 months.

• Cantaloupe5 days sealed in the fridge
• Apples4 weeks sealed in the fridge
• Grapes1 week sealed in the fridge
• Papaya1 week sealed in the fridge
• Honeydew2 days sealed in the pantry
• Watermelon3 days sealed in the fridge
• Pomegranate1 month sealed in the fridge
• Tamarind6 months sealed in the fridge

The rest of the Fresh Vegetables shelf

The USDA puts this product on the Fresh Vegetables shelf together with 58 others, and 7 of them keep longer outside the freezer. The shelf runs from Kimchi at 12 months down to Corn on the cob at 2 days. Nearest this product by window are Carrots, Ginger root and Rutabagas, which is the order the list below is printed in. Across the whole of Produce the same product ranks 13 of 89. The middle of the shelf is Basil, at 10 days. The shelf is the source's own subcategory, Fresh Vegetables inside Produce.

• Carrots3 weeks2 weeks sealed in the fridge
• Ginger root3 weeks2 weeks sealed in the fridge
• Rutabagas3 weeks2 weeks sealed in the fridge
• Yams/sweet potatoes3 weeks2 weeks sealed in the pantry
• Cilantro3 weeks2 weeks in the fridge
• Mint3 weeks2 weeks in the fridge
• Oregano3 weeks2 weeks in the fridge
• Rosemary3 weeks2 weeks in the fridge

If it has to keep longer than this

If it has to keep longer than 4 weeks, the Produce aisle gives 11 products that hold at least twice as long outside the freezer. The smallest step up is Cranberries at 2 months against this one's 4 weeks; after it come Onions, Potatoes and Spaghetti squash. They are printed below in the order the step gets bigger, not alphabetically. In the other direction, 60 entries in the category keep half as long or less, Blueberries and Melons among them. The largest step the category offers is Coconut at 1 year.

• Cranberries2 months2 months sealed in the fridge
• Onions2 months2 months sealed in the fridge
• Potatoes2 months1 month sealed in the pantry
• Spaghetti squash2 months2 months in the pantry
• Pomegranate3 months1 month sealed in the fridge
• Jicama4 months4 months sealed in the pantry
• Pumpkins5 months3 months sealed in the fridge
• Tamarind6 months6 months sealed in the fridge

The record this page is built from

This page is built from a single FoodKeeper row, record 491 — the source’s own number for it, not a position — one of the 661 rows in the snapshot. That row fills 3 of the nine storage slots with a time, and the binding figure on it is printed by the source in weeks, which is the unit this page keeps rather than converting it to days. The record carries 2 handling notes, quoted on this page word for word. It is filed under Fresh Vegetables inside Produce, which is where every shelf comparison on this page comes from.

Where these numbers come from

Every range on this page is published by the USDA FoodKeeper and reproduced unchanged. The multipliers, the rankings, the percentages and the dates are ours, computed from those ranges. Where the source gives a span such as 3 to 5 weeks, comparisons use the upper figure, and the full span is always printed.

Rankings cover only the items the USDA gives a usable figure for, and identical ranges share a place rather than being ordered arbitrarily. Neighbors are chosen by nearest storage time within the same category, never alphabetically: two foods filed next to each other by name usually have nothing to do with each other. The freezer is excluded from ranking because it flattens almost everything.

Where the USDA lists several kinds under one name, they share one page here and every kind keeps its own windows: the source prints them as separate rows, and a page that merged them would be inventing a figure the source never published. Comparisons and the place in the category are computed for the kind the plain name means — the shell egg for eggs, the can for tuna — which is settled name by name rather than by the order the source lists its rows in, and the page names it. Where the plain name means no single kind, the page prints no single figure at all and lists the kinds instead.

Source: USDA FoodKeeper, retrieved 1 September 2026. This site computes every comparison on this page and takes responsibility for it. Found a figure that does not match the source? Tell us on the contact page, with the page and the row — the parsing is mechanical, so a mismatch is our bug and we want it. How the whole site is built, which figures are ours and where the source can be checked is on the method page.

USDA index terms: baby carrot, carrot

KeepsUntil is an independent reference built on public USDA data. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to the U.S. Department of Agriculture or the Food and Drug Administration. Whether a given window is a safety limit or a quality window is stated on the page that prints it.