French Door Refrigerator With Ice Maker Review
Melding form with functionality, French-door refrigerators have elegant double doors that open up to an enormous fridge on the top and a freezer drawer below. Special features like through-the-door dispensers, ice machines with higher-end features, and customizable flex drawers make them stand out from the rest.
We consulted experts such as Ladina Schopf, an interior designer architect, founder, and co-founder of LS Projects, for tips on picking the right one. They evaluated storage capacity as well as layout and energy efficiency as well as other factors.
GE Profile Counter Depth French Door Refrigerator
Like its name implies, the GE Profile series is aimed at those who wish to incorporate cutting-edge technologies into their kitchen. The refrigerator is brimming with these, from an inside-the-door Keurig K-cup coffee maker to a smart water dispenser. But these flourishes don't mask mediocre performance, especially in the refrigerator's freezer and an ineffective temperature-controlled drawer. Since this refrigerator is more, I'd expect higher quality.
This refrigerator is a good option, despite the slight blip. It features a large freezer compartment, which is unusual for counter-depth French-door refrigerators. It also has a large capacity for frozen food compared to other models.
Inside the fridge, there are 17 shelves and compartments. The fridge compartment has 18.5 cubic feet, which is the standard for a French-door refrigerator at this price. It also has a decent-sized icemaker packed into the left-hand door, although it isn't the largest I've seen.
You can alter the shelves in both compartments to make a custom storage solution. The GE PYE22PYNFS's design for the interior is stylish, too. The LED lighting is an appealing feature. The storage bins in the door have a third shelf which can be folded down to store large items. The drawers include temperature controls that let you set them to Meat, Beverage or Deli settings. The drawers are simple to open and shut however I found the textured plastic coatings a bit hard on my fingers.
The GE PGE29BYTFS Smart Refrigerator has all the features you would expect from a refrigerator in this price range. It has Wi-Fi as well as app support, and GE's SmartHQ Software. The app is available on iOS and Android devices and allows you to control your refrigerator from anywhere around the world. It also offers numerous options for customizing. It also sends you notifications when the door is unlocked, when the fridge or freezer needs to be defrosted, and when the filter requires a change.
It would be nice if the GE PYE22PYNFS came with Precise Fill, an option available in other GE fridges that allows you to preset how many cups of water you'd like to pour out at once. The fridge displays a countdown to show you how much water remains, but it's not as helpful as Precise Fill.
Bosch Counter Depth French Door Refrigerator
The Bosch French-door Refrigerator is a striking piece. It's designed to look like a seamless piece of your kitchen. The fridge uses fingerprint-resistant stainless steel, which is a great feature for busy households. It also comes with a veggie compartment that keeps vegetables and fruits fresher for longer and dual compressors for maximum preservation of food. The ice maker we tested is one of the most efficient and makes the shape of a pyramid using only water. This fridge is the perfect option for a single family or kitchenettes that want a built-in look and top-of-the-line food preservation.
This refrigerator was the highest-rated refrigerator in our Refrigerators test, for various reasons. Its freezer temperatures held firm at a level that was just above 0 degrees Fahrenheit and never fluctuating by more than a fraction one degree. This is crucial to avoiding freezing burn. The fridge section of the refrigerator also did well. It reached the initial temperature set within a matter of hours, and remained at the temperature throughout our testing.
Bosch has a reputation for premium appliances, so it's no surprise that this counter depth refrigerator is also a smart appliance, with the option of connecting to your home Wi-Fi as well as Bosch's Home Connect platform. The app allows you to control and monitor the refrigerator remotely using your smartphone or tablet. The refrigerator is pricey however, it offers excellent features and functionality at a reasonable price.
It is important to know the limitations of your fridge. You may need to get creative with tall items because the fridge is limited in shelf space. Additionally the shelves aren't completely sprillproof, and can easily be stained or damaged by sharp objects. The trays are easily removed from the refrigerator. However, they must be cleaned frequently to stop the growth of mold.
If you're thinking about buying this refrigerator, be sure to review our opinions on the GE Appliances French Door Refrigerator as well as the Bosch Bottom Freezer Refrigerator.
LG Counter Depth French Door Refrigerator
The LG LRFLC2706S counter-depth refrigerator is a great option for those who need plenty of space in the space of a compact frame. It has a sleek, fingerprint-resistant stainless-steel finish and features thick handles that make them comfortable to grip. The fridge is built with a standard French door design, and two rows of shelves that can be used to capture spills and a set of crisper drawers. The upper right shelf can be folded down to give tall items more room. There's also a full-width drawer for deli and an inside water dispenser.
french door style fridge freezer of the great aspects of this refrigerator is that the Ice maker is located in the freezer, making it easy to move ice into the fridge to use as needed. The freezer is designed with thoughtful elements, for instance, sliding drawers that can help you better organize the placement of your items. It also comes with a large bin that holds plenty of frozen food items as well as an additional container for storing ice.
Another great feature of this refrigerator is its Smart InstaView panel. It allows you to control the fridge's temperature as well as lighting from your smartphone. It's a nice way to monitor and manage your refrigerator, especially if you're away from home.
The Smart InstaView feature is neat but it doesn't enhance the efficiency of the fridge. In fact it took longer to defrost and chill foods in this refrigerator than some of the others we tried. This could be due to the bigger capacity.
The doors pose a problem with this refrigerator. The sunken handles allow shorter people to open them from the bottom. However taller people have a hard time closing them without slamming them. It would have been much better if they had a front-mounted handles.
The LG Counter-Depth MAX fridge is an excellent choice for those looking to combine the look and feel of a French-door refrigerator with an efficient design. Its capacity is superior to counter-depth models and is able to cool evenly. It's also less expensive than the best counter-depth refrigerator with an ice maker, which can make it a popular choice.
Frigidaire Counter Depth French Door Refrigerator
If you're looking for a French door refrigerator that won't cost you a fortune, this Frigidaire is a great choice. It's a basic design that's not as striking in appearance as other models but it does have enough features to make it a good choice. Its most notable characteristic is the adjustable temperature drawer that helps keep food items like meat and vegetables fresher for longer. It also has a large water dispenser as well as a good Ice machine that is fast.
The "Chill Drawer", which sits above the two crisper bins, is a nice feature. This drawer allows you to redirect some of the fridge's cooling power to this area, so that you can store foods which need extra attention. This feature can be adjusted using an outside slider that is located inside the drawer. You can also alter the general cooling settings for the entire fridge. I've found that the generic settings are more effective than the specific ones.
In my tests, the temperatures of the refrigerator stayed fairly consistent across different areas of the fridge. The temperatures in the top, bottom and middle of the refrigerator did not differ significantly from 38 degrees. This is a good performance, but it isn't quite at the top of our ratings.
This fridge has a few other neat features, including a temperature-monitoring display that alerts you to fluctuations and provides a forecast for the day ahead. You can also combine this fridge with a smart thermometer to get more precise readings of the internal temperature of your fridge.
The exterior of the Frigidaire is made of gray-bodied stainless with a "smudge resistant" finish. It does an excellent job of removing streaks and fingerprints, even compared to glossy stainless steel finishes on other appliances I've tried.
Stephanie Cronk is the executive editor of Reviewed's Commerce/Product Reviews team and oversees the site's buyer's guides and review of test products. She has over 15 years of experience in publishing and commerce including retail and digital. Stephanie is enthusiastic about finding and recommending the top products for consumers, with a particular focus on home items and technology.