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  • Design & Usability

  • Performance & Features

  • Conclusion

  • The Cold Hard Facts

  • Temperature Performance

  • Moisture Retention

  • Freezing & Thawing

  • Storage Space & Energy Efficiency

  • Design & Usability
  • Performance & Features
  • Conclusion
  • The Cold Hard Facts
  • Temperature Performance
  • Moisture Retention
  • Freezing & Thawing
  • Storage Space & Energy Efficiency

Despite the spacious interior and all those features, we weren't thrilled with the fridge's ability to maintain a constant temperature. It can't be easy to cool that much space, but a fridge this big needs to stay consistent if you're potentially storing hundreds of dollars worth of food in there.

Design & Usability

This white whale is heavy—with features.

The top pair of shelves smoothly slide back for further customization.

The white 72092 may not be quite as chic as its stainless steel sibling—the 72093 (MSRP $4,199)—but it has all the trimmings you'd expect from a high-end fridge. Behind those French doors, you get four adjustable shelves—two on each side—that make many temporary and more fixed configurations possible. Each of the top pairs of these shelves smoothly slides back for that vase of flowers or magnum of Dom. At the bottom, there's a variable humidity crisper on the left and an airtight one on the right. That one has a rubber seal to lock in the moisture.

For more isolated fridge space, a temperature-controlled multi-purpose drawer—with temperature options for meat, deli, and produce—and two small compartments with sliding covers sit below the crispers. These small, shallow bins would have otherwise been wasted space, so it's neat to have a place to store some small, shallow items.

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The right side of the door features one butter shelf, two main shelves, and one small, bottom shelf that looks too small for anything but film canisters. Except for the bottom shelf, all can move around to make way for tall bottles. The three shelves on the left side are fixed, thanks to the icemaker, but offer plenty of space for condiments. And on the outside, the ice dispenser and front control panel are easy to operate and don't blemish the exterior.

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Easy Freeze

Unlike most bottom freezers, the pullout freezer's door tilts forward when you pull it out, adding to this Kenmore's already solid usability. A lower bin dominates the space, and has a center divider that moves a little to accommodate large items. A shallow drawer and a closed off drawer round out the space above. Some of those innovations take up space, but we'll take the tradeoff.

Performance & Features

Nobody said being cool was easy.

The {{product.name}} may have tons of space and features, but it had trouble maintaining a constant temperature, as the mercury slowly crept up throughout our testing. Since this fridge is considerably larger than others we've seen, we can only blame the added capacity for the discrepancy. We open the door six times in 72 hours, and chances are the fridge took some time to get its groove back. But even though the fridge's overall temperature increased, the difference from low to high wasn't major.

The airtight crisper locked in humidity extremely well.

The airtight crisper locked in humidity quite well, keeping your lettuce crisp for longer. It performed far better than the poor variable-humidity drawer to its left, which did a below-average job of locking in the moisture.

The freezer maintained consistent cold temperatures, which prevents freezer burn. Our freeze test—a sort of reverse zero to 60 test—showed that food should take just over two hours to freeze. That's hardly fast, but then again, this freezer has a ton of space to cool.

For in-depth performance information, please visit the Science Page.

Conclusion

Think hard. Do you really need a giant fridge? If so, consider this Kenmore.

Not everyone needs a giant fridge. But if you've got a large family and a large budget, the {{product.name}} is definitely worthy of your consideration. It's smooth to use and has many worthwhile features. In fact, its few drawbacks—long freezing times, trouble recovering temperatures, high price—are direct results of its huge size.

If you can make do with something smaller, that would be our recommendation. But if you really need a whopping 33 cubic feet, at least get out the measuring tape first: This one may be too big for your kitchen.

The Cold Hard Facts

While the features and spacious capacity are probably the most important factors for the {{product.name}}'s ($3,999) prospective buyers, performance is always a concern. Our thorough tests include five temperature sensors throughout the fridge and freezer, and we test long enough to tell the whole story. This Kenmore holds up in many respects, but we're a little concerned about the steady creep in temperature, despite the thermostat's constant setting of 37°F.

Temperature Performance

As always, we set the fridge to the normal 37°F setting and the freezer to 0°F. Over our testing period, the fridge averaged 41.2°F, and the freezer averaged -2.7°F. We were fine with the freezer's temperature and found that it hardly fluctuated at all, and averaged less than half a degree from the mean temperature at any given moment. The fridge, however, had risen from 39°F to 43°F by the end of the 72-hour stability test, called that because the temperature is supposed to remain stable. It did rise very smoothly—at a given moment it was 0.6°F away from 41.2°F—but we don't like to see that inconsistency over time.

It's difficult to cool such a large space, and these kinks are likely caused by growing pains. Since the thermostat always said 37°F, we'd recommend keeping a thermometer in a glass of water inside the fridge.

Moisture Retention

The Kenmore's airtight crisper did a spectacular job at locking in the moisture. Our test found a loss of just 0.10 grams of water per hour, a tiny number. To compare, a standard variable-humidity crisper generally loses around 0.30 grams of water per hour when set on the most-humid setting. This airtight one is three times better and will keep your produce fresh.

Freezing & Thawing

The freezing situation was pretty average—it took just over two hours to freeze 500 g of our food substitute. However, there's tons of room in the giant bottom freezer. As with the fridge, you sometimes have to pay for performance writ large.

In a simulation of a power outage, the freezer retained its cold air quite well, still well below 32°F after 36 hours. Most fridges do well in this test today—thanks, good insulation!—but it's good to see a plus-size fridge pass the test.

Storage Space & Energy Efficiency

As with all fridges, this one's billed capacity (of a whopping 33 cubic feet!) is a bit misleading. While its interior dimensions might suggest a space that large, the dividers, shelves, lighting, and other space-suckers reduce that significantly.

Since these dividers and shelves convert that cavity into more useful space, we don't really mind. All the features contribute to added usability and convenience. Still, the difference isn't insignificant: We counted 21.4 cubic feet against the 33—14.9 in the freezer, and 6.6 in the fridge (we rounded, hence the disconnect in math). Kenmore claims 22 and 10.5 cubic feet. It doesn't really matter, you don't think of your fridge in cubic feet. Take our word for it until you stand in front yourself—it's a giant fridge.

Meet the tester

Ethan Wolff-Mann

Ethan Wolff-Mann

Staff Writer

@ethanwolffmann

Ethan writes reviews and articles about science for Reviewed.com, and edits the Science Blog. He's originally from Vermont and thinks the bicycle and guitar are examples of perfected technology. Prior to Reviewed.com, he studied furiously at Middlebury College.

See all of Ethan Wolff-Mann's reviews

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