Why Your Refrigerator Runs Constantly

A refrigerator runs constantly when it can't get rid of heat fast enough, or when warm air keeps sneaking in. When we pull one out from the wall, it's usually dusty coils or a door seal that gave up. Long running on its own isn't a fault, though. What matters is whether the shelves are still cold.

How long a fridge should run

Your old fridge probably ran in bursts. Click, hum for a while, click, quiet. Plenty of newer ones don't work like that anymore. They have variable speed compressors that just keep going at low speed for hours. They're quiet about it and use less power that way. So a fridge that seems to be always on may be perfectly fine.

Don't trust your ears on this one. Trust a thermometer. Stand one in a cup of water in the center of the fridge overnight. You want 40°F or lower there and 0°F in the freezer, which is what the FDA recommends. Numbers look right? Then the hum is just how your model works.

A new fridge that never seems to stop

Right after delivery a fridge has to pull a warm cabinet all the way down to temperature. That's a long run, and most manuals say to give it about a day before you load it up or decide something's wrong. Fill it with room temperature groceries and it goes back to work for a while too.

Still going nonstop a few days later? Look at how it was installed. It should stand level. It also needs the clearance at the back and sides that the manual asks for. We've seen brand new fridges squeezed into a cabinet with no air around them, and the condenser just can't breathe in there.

Dirty coils and blocked airflow

All the heat the fridge pulls out of your food has to go somewhere. It goes out through the condenser coils, with a fan blowing room air across them. Coat those coils with dust and pet hair and the heat stays put. The compressor keeps running because it never quite catches up.

On most newer models the coils hide underneath, behind the kick plate down at the floor. Older fridges have them on the back. Unplug it, pop the grille off and go after them with a long coil brush and the vacuum. Plug it back in and make sure the condenser fan is actually spinning.

Inside matters too. The cold air comes in through vents on the back wall. Shove a turkey or a case of soda up against them and the thermostat thinks the whole fridge is warm.

Warm air sneaking past the door

A torn or flattened gasket leaks kitchen air in all day and all night. Same thing if the door doesn't fully close. Test the seal with a sheet of paper. Close the door on it in a few places around the edge and tug. If the paper slides right out, that spot isn't sealing.

Sometimes the gasket's fine and it's the fridge itself. Tipped a little forward, the doors drift open a crack. Turn the front leveling legs until the doors swing closed on their own. And check that a crisper drawer or a tall jar in the door isn't holding it open.

The room and the dial

Put a fridge beside the oven or in afternoon sun and it's fighting the room. A garage in July is even rougher. In a hot spell that can turn into almost nonstop running. We wrote more about that in how hot weather affects a refrigerator.

Check the controls while you're at it. Somebody may have cranked the freezer to the coldest setting, or turned on a fast cool mode and forgot. Set both back to the middle and give it a day.

Frost and fans inside the freezer

Behind the back panel of the freezer there's a cold coil called the evaporator. A small heater kicks on from time to time to melt the frost off it. If that defrost system quits, frost keeps building until air can hardly get through. Now the compressor runs and runs, and hardly any cold makes it to your shelves. Look at the freezer's back wall. Thick white frost there is your clue.

The fan that pushes that air can die too. Open the freezer, press the door switch in and listen. You should hear it whirring. If the compressor is humming at the back but the freezer is silent, we'd suspect the evaporator fan motor.

When the compressor itself is running constantly

Now and then the compressor runs constantly because something's wrong in the sealed system. A slow refrigerant leak, or a compressor that's getting weak. The fridge works hard and has nothing to show for it. Temperatures creep up over days, and the frost in the freezer only covers part of the coil.

That's not a DIY job. It takes proper testing, and on an older fridge the bill can come close to a new one. You'll know the price before any work starts, so the choice stays yours.

What to check before you call

Thermometer first, then the dial. After that, coils and the paper test on the gasket. Pull food off the vents. Peek at the freezer's back wall for frost. Give it a few hours after each change, because a fridge doesn't recover instantly.

If it's still running all the time and the inside is warm, call. A fridge that never rests wears out its compressor faster, and you pay for every extra hour on the power bill.

Booking a fridge repair near Parma

We test the fans and the defrost parts right in your kitchen, along with the controls. You hear the price first, and the repair comes with a 90-day warranty. Call (216) 352-3935 or book on our refrigerator repair page. If the long running came with a new rattle or click, our guide to refrigerator noises helps you figure out which part is talking.

Questions people ask