How long do Onions last in the fridge?
Turning the range into a date
Onions (yellow, white, red, etc.) keep 2 months in the fridge from purchase. Each kind gets its own dated rows here, 6 rows across the 2 the USDA lists under this name, because a date is only worth printing against the window it belongs to.
Onions, yellow, white, red, etc.
- In the freezerUse by10 months to 12 months after the day you bought it
- From purchase · in the pantryUse by1 month after the day you bought it
- From purchase · in the fridgeUse by2 months after the day you bought it
Onions, spring or green
- In the freezerUse by10 months to 12 months after the day you bought it
- From purchase · in the pantryUse by1 month after the day you bought it
- From purchase · in the fridgeUse by1 week after the day you bought it
The USDA rates 2 kinds of this separately
Onions, spring or green keeps 1 week, which is shorter than the window this page answers with. The USDA files 2 separate entries under this name — yellow, white, red, etc. and spring or green — and they do not keep for the same time: Onions, spring or green holds 1 month outside the freezer, Onions, yellow, white, red, etc. holds 2 months.
The freezer helps less here than you would expect
The freezer buys less here than its reputation suggests: 6 times what the refrigerator gives, 2 months against 12 months, both still measured in months. For this item freezing is an extension rather than a different way of keeping it. On the same shelf it sits 8 of 89, between Cranberries at 2 months and Potatoes at 2 months. Yellow, white and red are the same food in the source list.
Every storage figure the USDA publishes for this item
All three places the USDA recognizes are rated here — pantry, refrigerator and freezer — which only 65 of the 466 foods in the data manage. The source also indexes it as yellow, white, red and spring.
Onions, yellow, white, red, etc.
- In the freezer10 months to 12 months
- From purchase · in the pantry1 month
- From purchase · in the fridge2 months
Onions, spring or green
- In the freezer10 months to 12 months
- From purchase · in the pantry1 month
- From purchase · in the fridge1 week
Can you freeze onions?
Yes. The USDA gives onions (yellow, white, red, etc.) 10–12 months in the freezer from the day you buy them, and held at 0 °F food stays safe beyond that: the figure is about quality. Most produce goes soft when thawed, so frozen it suits cooking, smoothies and sauces rather than eating raw.
How to tell if onions have gone bad
Go by the date first: onions keep 2 months in the fridge. Mold, slime, a sour smell or soft dark spots mean it goes out; firm produce can be saved by cutting 1 inch around a small moldy spot, soft produce cannot. Refrigerate cut or peeled produce within 2 hours.
Sources: USDA FSIS: the danger zone USDA FSIS: freezing and food safety USDA FSIS: molds on food FDA: are you storing food safely FoodSafety.gov: the FoodKeeper app.
Is it still safe to eat, or just past its best?
The answer at the top of this page reads 2 months in the fridge. What decides that is the food and not the shelf the source files it on: Onions, yellow, white, red, etc. is raw and whole. Past it, whether it has gone bad is yours to judge by look and smell: this window rates quality, not the day it turns hazardous.
It is past the date. Now what?
Say the calculator above puts Onions, yellow, white, red, etc. past its 2 months in the fridge window. Past that the calendar stops deciding and the food itself does. Mold, a slimy or sticky surface, soft or darkened spots, or a sour smell mean it goes out whatever the date says.
The whole rule, including the cases the source does not cover, is set out under what to do when the date has passed.
Two places, and one of them is the wrong one
The USDA rates two places for Onions, yellow, white, red, etc. in one state and they disagree: 2 months in the fridge against 1 month in the pantry. This page answers with the refrigerator, the longer of the two. Both figures are the USDA's own, so this is a choice of where to put the food rather than a disagreement about how long it keeps.
Items that behave the same way
All 3 of the 6 items nearest Onions, yellow, white, red, etc. keep exactly as long as it does, 2 months, so the ranking around it is a tie rather than an order.
Where these numbers come from
Every storage time on this page is the USDA’s own published figure from the FoodKeeper data, one of the 9 it keeps per food, reproduced unchanged and never an estimate of ours. Where the USDA lists several kinds under one name, each kind keeps its own windows, and the page names the kind its answer is for. The dates and multipliers are ours, computed from those ranges.
Source: USDA FoodKeeper, retrieved 1 September 2026. Found a figure that does not match the source? Tell us on the contact page. How the site is built is on the method page.
Comparisons and the place in the category are computed for Onions, yellow, white, red, etc., which is the kind the plain name means here, chosen kind by kind rather than by the order the source happens to list them in.
USDA index terms: green, onion, red, spring, white, yellow
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.