How long doBananaslast in the fridge?
Freezing changes the unit, not just the number
Here the freezer does not so much extend the answer as replace it. 3 days in the refrigerator becomes 3 months in the freezer: 30 times longer, and days turning into months. The freezer figure alone spans 2 months to 3 months, a factor of 1.5.
Every storage figure the USDA publishes for this item
The USDA gives this item no pantry time in days: the 2 figures that carry numbers are all cold ones, and the pantry slot is answered in words instead. Within Produce it is filed under Fresh Fruits.
- In the freezer2 months to 3 months
- In the pantryUntil ripe
- In the fridge3 days
Where the USDA answers in words instead of days
1 of the nine slots the USDA keeps for this item holds an answer that is not a number, and an answer in words is still an answer: in the pantry it answers Until ripe, so the clock is the fruit's own ripening rather than a count of days.
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 refrigerator. Timeline for refrigerator applies to ripe fruit; skin will blacken.
In the pantry. Ripe is when this item is tender, fully developed and ready to eat.
Turning the range into a date
The window here is 3 days, short enough that the day it went in is worth writing down. The field for this one is at the top of the page, above the answer it changes.
- In the freezerUse by2 months to 3 months after the day you stored it
- In the fridgeUse by3 days after the day you stored it
Is this window about safety or about taste?
The answer at the top of this page reads 3 days in the fridge. What decides that is the food and not the shelf the source files it on: Bananas 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 Bananas past its 3 days 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.
The two sides of that multiplier are not the same dish
The 30× multiplier on this page is drawn across a change of preparation: the source's note on the refrigerator figure reads "Timeline for refrigerator applies to ripe fruit; skin will blacken". It divides 3 months frozen by 3 days in the fridge, and those two are not the same dish. A multiplier whose sides are different preparations is worth printing only with the source's own scope note beside it.
Is that a long time?
7 items in the Produce list keep exactly as long as this item, 3 days, so they all share place 82 of 89 rather than being put in an order the data does not support. Among the 340 foods the USDA also gives a refrigerator figure, it keeps longer than 10% of them.
Items that behave the same way
All 3 of the 6 items nearest this item keep exactly as long as it does, 3 days, so the ranking around it is a tie rather than an order.
Products the USDA rates in the same places
This is a common shape of record: 33 of the 466 products are rated in the same places, freezer and refrigerator, and 7 of the nine slots are left blank on all of them. Sorted by how close their windows are to this one, the nearest are Parsley, Bratwurst and Egg dishes, and the rest of that group is what the list below draws on. Of the 8 shown, 5 keep longer than this one. The longest-keeping of them is Egg dishes at 4 days. Counted more loosely, by which of the three places are rated at all, 132 products match this one.
- Parsley2 days in the fridge
- Bratwurst2 days in the fridgefresh
- Egg dishes3 days in the fridge
- Stuffed, raw chicken breasts1 day in the fridge
- Cooked poultry dishes3 days in the fridge
- Fried chicken3 days in the fridge
- Poultry pieces3 days in the fridge
- Cooked fish3 days in the fridge
The rest of the Fresh Fruits shelf
The USDA puts this product on the Fresh Fruits shelf together with 29 others, and 26 of them keep longer outside the freezer. The shelf runs from Coconut at 1 year down to Cherries at 3 days. Nearest this product by window are Strawberries, Raspberries and Cherries, which is the order the list below is printed in. Across the whole of Produce the same product ranks 82 of 89. The middle of the shelf is Grapes, at 1 week. The shelf is the source's own subcategory, Fresh Fruits inside Produce.
- Strawberries3 days2 days sealed in the fridge
- Raspberries3 days2 days sealed in the fridge
- Cherries3 days2 days sealed in the fridge
- Avocados4 days3 days in the fridge
- Cherimoya4 days4 days in the fridge
- Guava4 days2 days in the fridge
- Watermelon4 days3 days sealed in the fridge
- Apricots5 days2 days in the fridge
If it has to keep longer than this
If it has to keep longer than 3 days, the Produce aisle gives 65 products that hold at least twice as long outside the freezer. The smallest step up is Kiwi fruit at 6 days against this one's 3 days; after it come Cucumbers, Grapes and Papaya. They are printed below in the order the step gets bigger, not alphabetically. The largest step the category offers is Coconut at 1 year. Freezing this one instead would reach 3 months, which the comparison above leaves out on purpose.
- Kiwi fruit6 days3 days in the fridge
- Cucumbers6 days4 days sealed in the fridge
- Grapes1 week1 week sealed in the fridge
- Papaya1 week1 week sealed in the fridge
- Pineapple7 days5 days in the fridge
- Eggplant7 days4 days sealed in the fridge
- Mushrooms7 days3 days sealed in the fridge
- Rhubarb7 days3 days sealed in the fridge
The record this page is built from
This page is built from a single FoodKeeper row, record 251 — the source’s own number for it, not a position — one of the 661 rows in the snapshot. That row fills 2 of the nine storage slots with a time, and the source prints its binding figure in days, so the window at the top of this page is the source's own number untouched. 1 slot is answered in words instead of days, and printed as the source wrote it.
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: banana
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.