How long doesSoy sauce or teriyaki saucelast in the fridge once opened?

What opening the package actually costs

Opening the package is the decision that settles this page. Sealed, the item holds 3 years sealed in the pantry; once open it holds 1 month open in the fridge, the same food measured in months instead of years, a drop of 36 times.

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.

• Unopened · in the pantry3 years
• Once opened · in the fridge1 month

What the USDA adds in words

The USDA attaches 1 handling note to this item, reproduced below word for word. It is about safety rather than quality, which is the distinction this data is easiest to get wrong. 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 pantry. Refrigeration ensures that commercial sauces and condiments stay fresh for a longer period of time. Shelf-stable commercial soy sauce and teriyaki sauce are safe when stored at room temperature after opening. Quality, not safety, is the reason the labels on these products suggest that they be refrigerated after opening.

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, 2 rows in all.

• Unopened · in the pantryUse by3 years after the day you bought it
• Once opened · in the fridgeUse by1 month after the day you opened it

Is this window about safety or about taste?

The answer at the top of this page reads 1 month in the fridge once opened. What decides that is the record's own note: the source says quality, not safety, is why the label asks for the refrigerator once open. 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 Soy sauce or teriyaki sauce past its 1 month in the fridge once opened window. Past that the calendar stops deciding and the food itself does. A jar or can that is bulging, leaking or rusted goes out unopened, and so does an opened one with mold at the rim or a sour, fizzing smell.

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?

Among the 41 items the USDA files under Condiments, Sauces & Canned Goods, this item ranks 4 by how long it keeps outside the freezer. Anchovies, canned holds 5 years, Relish holds 30 months. Among the 340 foods the USDA also gives a refrigerator figure, it keeps longer than 71% of them.

Items that behave the same way

The 6 items nearest it sit inside a band of 2 years to 30 months — a tight cluster, and this item at 3 years is inside it.

• Relishkeeps 30 months sealed in the pantry
• Dry gravy mixeskeeps 1 day in the fridgeup to 2 years sealed in the pantry
• Honeykeeps 2 years sealed in the pantry
• Mustardkeeps 1 year in the fridge once opened
• Thai red curry pastekeeps 5 days in the fridge once openedup to 2 years sealed in the pantry
• Cranberry saucekeeps 1 week in the fridge once openedcanned · up to 2 years sealed in the pantry

Products the USDA rates in the same places

This is a common shape of record: 27 of the 466 products are rated in the same places, pantry from the day of purchase and refrigerator after opening, 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 Refried beans, Chocolate syrup and Thai red curry paste, and the rest of that group is what the list below draws on. Of the ones shown, none keeps longer than this one does.

• Refried beans2 days in the fridge once openedup to 3 years sealed in the pantry
• Chocolate syrup6 months in the fridge once openedup to 2 years sealed in the pantry
• Thai red curry paste5 days in the fridge once openedup to 2 years sealed in the pantry
• Black bean sauce3 months in the fridge once openedup to 24 months sealed in the pantry
• Oyster sauce3 months in the fridge once openedup to 24 months sealed in the pantry
• Hoisin sauce3 months in the fridge once openedup to 24 months sealed in the pantry
• Jams6 months in the fridge once opened
• Spaghetti sauce4 days in the fridge once openedup to 18 months sealed in the pantry

The rest of the Condiments, Sauces & Canned Goods shelf

The USDA puts this product on the Condiments, Sauces & Canned Goods shelf together with 40 others, and 3 of them keep longer outside the freezer. The shelf runs from Gravy at 5 years down to Aioli at 4 days. Nearest this product by window are Relish, Dry gravy mixes and Honey, which is the order the list below is printed in. Across the whole of Condiments, Sauces & Canned Goods the same product ranks 4 of 41. The middle of the shelf is Pickles, at 1 year.

• Relish30 months30 months sealed in the pantry
• Dry gravy mixes2 years1 day in the fridge
• Honey2 years2 years sealed in the pantry
• Mustard2 years1 year in the fridge once opened
• Sauce mixes2 years2 years sealed in the pantry
• Vinegar2 years2 years sealed in the pantry
• Thai red curry paste2 years5 days in the fridge once opened
• Cranberry sauce2 years1 week in the fridge once opened

If it has to keep longer than this

Nothing the USDA files under Condiments, Sauces & Canned Goods keeps at least twice as long as this one outside the freezer. It runs the other way: 26 entries in the category keep half as long or less, among them Jams, Spaghetti sauce and Barbecue sauce. So the question this page answers is not what to buy instead, but what this product outlasts on the same shelf, and by how much. Twice as long is the cutoff used here, so a product a few days apart from this one is not treated as a step.

• Jams18 months6 months in the fridge once opened
• Spaghetti sauce18 months4 days in the fridge once opened
• Barbecue sauce1 year4 months in the fridge once opened
• Chutney1 year1 month in the fridge once opened
• Ketchup1 year6 months in the fridge once opened
• Marinades1 year6 months in the fridge once opened
• Pickles1 year1 month in the fridge once opened
• Salsa1 year1 month in the fridge once opened

The record this page is built from

This page is built from a single FoodKeeper row, record 360 — 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 binding figure on it is printed by the source in years, which is the unit this page keeps rather than converting it to days. The record carries 1 handling note, quoted on this page word for word. Every figure here comes from one fixed snapshot, USDA FoodKeeper, retrieved 1 September 2026, and is not refreshed page by page.

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: sauce, soy, Soy sauce, teriyaki, teriyaki sauce

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.