How long doOilslast in the pantry once opened?
Sealed against opened
Opening the package costs 2.4 times here: 12 months sealed in the pantry against 5 months open in the pantry. That is a real difference and worth dating the container for, but not the collapse it becomes for the more perishable items in the same list.
Every storage figure the USDA publishes for this item
The USDA gives this item a pantry and a refrigerator figure and no freezer figure at all, the pattern behind 79 of the 466 foods in the data. Within Baked Goods it is filed under Baking and Cooking.
- Unopened · in the pantry6 months to 12 months
- Once opened · in the pantry3 months to 5 months
- Once opened · in the fridge4 months
Turning the range into a date
Two clocks run on this item: one from the day it went into storage and one from the day the seal broke. Both are listed below, 3 rows in all.
- Unopened · in the pantryUse by6 months to 12 months after the day you bought it
- Once opened · in the pantryUse by3 months to 5 months after the day you opened it
- Once opened · in the fridgeUse by4 months after the day you opened it
Is this window about safety or about taste?
The answer at the top of this page reads 3 months to 5 months in the pantry once opened. The USDA rating this place at all is the USDA saying Oils, olive or vegetable keeps there, so the figure rates how good it will be. Past it, judge it by look and smell: this window rates how good the food will be, not the day it becomes a hazard.
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 Oils, olive or vegetable past its 3 months to 5 months in the pantry once opened window. Past that the calendar stops deciding and the food itself does. Mold takes the whole package out rather than the slice it grew on, and so does a musty or old-oil smell in a flour or a mix.
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.
Is that a long time?
9 items in the Baked Goods list keep exactly as long as this item, 12 months, so they all share place 25 of 52 rather than being put in an order the data does not support. Among the 244 foods the USDA also gives a pantry figure, it keeps longer than 41% of them.
Items that behave the same way
All 6 of the 6 items nearest this item keep exactly as long as it does, 12 months, so the ranking around it is a tie rather than an order.
Products the USDA rates in the same places
8 other products are rated in exactly these places — pantry from the day of purchase, pantry after opening and refrigerator after opening — out of the 466 in the file, so this is an uncommon shape of record. The nearest of them by keeping time are Flour, Nut oils and Tamarind paste. 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 Cornmeal at 2 years.
- Flour6 months in the pantry once openedwhite
- Nut oils6 months in the fridge once opened
- Tamarind paste6 months in the pantry once opened
- Sun dried tomatoes3 months in the fridge once openedup to 1 year sealed in the pantry
- Fruits, dried6 months in the fridge once opened
- Fruit Juice in cartons8 days in the fridge once openedup to 3 weeks sealed in the pantry
- Cornmeal6 months sealed in the pantryregular, degerminated · up to 2 years in the pantry once opened
- Rice1 year in the pantry once openedwhite or wild · up to 2 years sealed in the pantry
The rest of the Baking and Cooking shelf
The USDA puts this product on the Baking and Cooking shelf together with 34 others, and 23 of them keep longer outside the freezer. The shelf runs from Baking soda at 3 years down to Herbs at 10 days. Nearest this product by window are Flour, Frosting or icing and Gelatin, which is the order the list below is printed in. Across the whole of Baked Goods the same product ranks 25 of 52. The middle of the shelf is Cornstarch, at 24 months. The shelf is the source's own subcategory, Baking and Cooking inside Baked Goods.
- Flour12 months6 months in the pantry once opened
- Frosting or icing12 months2 weeks in the fridge once opened
- Gelatin12 months3 months in the pantry once opened
- Nut oils12 months6 months in the fridge once opened
- Tamarind paste12 months6 months in the pantry once opened
- Tapiocas12 months12 months in the pantry once opened
- Coconut flour12 months9 months in the fridge
- Cocoa and cocoa mixes1 year1 year in the pantry once opened
If it has to keep longer than this
If it has to keep longer than 12 months, the Baked Goods aisle gives 19 products that hold at least twice as long outside the freezer. The smallest step up is Cornstarch at 24 months against this one's 12 months; after it come Sugar, Chocolate and Cornmeal. They are printed below in the order the step gets bigger, not alphabetically. In the other direction, 18 entries in the category keep half as long or less, Flavored or herb mixes and Cookies among them. The largest step the category offers is Spice/spices at 3 years.
- Cornstarch24 months18 months in the pantry once opened
- Sugar24 months18 months in the pantry once opened
- Chocolate2 years1 year in the pantry once opened
- Cornmeal2 years6 months sealed in the pantry
- Vegetable oil sprays2 years1 year in the pantry once opened
- Shortening2 years6 months in the pantry once opened
- Chili powder2 years2 years in the pantry once opened
- Seasoning blends2 years1 year in the pantry once opened
The record this page is built from
This page is built from a single FoodKeeper row, record 227 — 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 months, which is the unit this page keeps rather than converting it to days. It is filed under Baking and Cooking inside Baked Goods, 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: oil, Oils, olive, vegetable
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.