How Long Do Refrigerator Filters Last

Tom Lohr is an avid home improvement enthusiast. He prefers to spend the money he saves on new tools and gardening supplies.

Water filters are the real cash cow of the appliance industry. Like clockwork, the "modify filter" light comes on every six months, prompting you lot to change your water filter. According to most manufacturers, if you lot don't, a giant asteroid will collide with the earth, and nosotros will all be killed. In reality, each fourth dimension that lite illuminates, the company that sold you lot your fridge hears a cash annals.

H2o filters are non cheap. If you stick with the recommended brand (of course supplied by the manufacturer), you lot will be shelling out somewhere between $20–50. I am not sure about you, but spending $50 every six months hits my wallet pretty hard.

The same could be said of the motorcar industry. For decades, automakers swore that you needed to change your oil every iii,000 miles or risk serious engine damage. As it turns out, nether normal driving weather condition, your oil lasts significantly longer than that.

It is the aforementioned with refrigerator h2o filters. They practice not need to be changed twice a year. One time a yr, maybe. That 50 bucks you salve could fill up a shelf on your fridge with something you actually need—say, beer, for instance.

What Is Inside Your Refrigerator H2o Filter

I just inverse my filter last week, later four years. I figured it was time. The area I live in has very hard water, and I imagined the within of my filter being choked with hard water deposits.

And so I bit the bullet, bought an off-make filter (much cheaper than the manufacturer's make), and changed it out. The procedure was super simple. But now that I had that old filter in my mitt, I had to know just how nasty it was on the within. So, I cut it open up to see.

After locking down the filter in a vise, I introduced it to my hacksaw. After five minutes of sawing, the mystery of the inside of fridge water filters was revealed. Franky, I was underwhelmed.

Inside that thick, plastic shell is a round charcoal filter with a pigsty in it. At that place was no nastiness, no slime, no goo, and absolutely no difficult h2o deposits. I even cut the charcoal element in half and was even more underwhelmed.

After purging the air out of the line by dispensing ten or and so glasses of h2o, the flow was the same, and the taste was the same. Personally, I think information technology could have gone another four years without changing.

Curlicue to Keep

Hit the Reset

According to the manufacturer's manuals, the charcoal element volition somewhen stop filtering out the nasty creatures that live in the h2o. But recall of what feeds your water filter: city tap water.

The h2o supplied by your municipality is tested regularly and deemed prophylactic to potable. Then information technology runs through your refrigerator filter. If you have funky tasting water in your locale, then maybe it helps. But in most cases, it isn't doing much.

If your water is tasting funny and y'all begin to see blackness bits of charcoal in your dispensed water, or if the flow is significantly reduced, and then, by all means, spend the dough and get a new filter. Otherwise, consider saving a few bucks and striking the filter reset button.

One of Two Filter End Pieces — 1 of Two Filter End Pieces

Tom Lohr

This commodity is accurate and true to the best of the author's cognition. Content is for informational or amusement purposes simply and does not substitute for personal counsel or professional advice in business, financial, legal, or technical matters.

Questions & Answers

Question: If I don't utilize my refrigerator ice maker or h2o practise I but practise reset when cherry-red light goes on?

Answer: Yes.

Question: I have a model RF261 BEAESR Samsung refrigerator and I need to change the water filter. The manual says to turn off the water, but I cannot move the fridge to get to the water valve. Do I accept to turn off the water before changing the filter?

Answer: On my Samsung, I did not have to shut off the water. Your model may exist different. I recommend shutting off your main house water line if you cannot reach your desiccated fridge line. Better condom than sorry.

Ron on April 16, 2019:

It must be ii years since I installed my first filter and I noticed the water improvement over the tap right away, very glad for that. And afterwards all this fourth dimension it still seems fine to me, I just keep resetting the light.

Angel Guzman from Joliet, Illinois on March 17, 2019:

After six months Sears mailed me one and my carte du jour charged. The water taste fine to me and its been 7 months at present. Haven't changed it still.