The Best Small Freezers for Meal Prep

BY Micaela January 13, 2021

Working from home, trying to lose weight, or just trying to get healthy for the new year? Bring on meal prepping to help you save time and money. When you meal prep efficiently, you keep up to three days’ worth of food in the refrigerator and freeze the rest of your meals. Your excess meal prepped foods such as your protein pancakes, burrito bowls, slow cooker chicken, and other make-ahead dishes have their own space in your freezer. Here are some tips if you are out of room in your existing freezer and consider making a second freezer purchase. 

The Ideal Size 

Freezer manufacturers recommend at least one and a half cubic feet per person; therefore, a family of four needs six cubic foot freezer space. If your existing freezer is 2.5 cubic feet, you need 3.5 additional cubic feet of freezer space for your family of four. You will also need to figure out if you will be making other healthy lifestyle commitments beyond meal prepping. Will you be adding a subscription of produce, buying a 1/4 side of beef from a local farm, or planting a garden this year? The next step is determining what type of freezer fits best for your space.

Compact Cubic Chest Freezer 

As the smallest in the freezer category, compact chest freezers are usually the cheapest option. The options range from 1.7 cubic feet to 5.0 cubic feet for a compact freezer. Compact freezers usually have drawers that move back and forth on rails, and some styles come with removable storage baskets that keep your food organized so you can find all your items. If the model you consider doesn’t have storage baskets, you can purchase these plastic baskets online to organize your space. Most chest freezers must be defrosted manually, although some models are frost-free or have automatic defrost options. Chest freezers will also help your food stay frozen for up to three days without power. They are light and portable, so you can easily move them around – upstairs, downstairs, garage, or the holiday home without much effort.

Space-saving Upright Freezer 

How much room do you have to swing the door? A 1.1 cubic feet to 5.0 cubic feet upright freezer takes up less space in your laundry room, garage, or basement than a medium or large chest freezer, but you need to measure how much room you have to open and close your fridge door. While they have up to 15% less storage space than a chest freezer, they are easier to organize because you can see the contents. They may have pull-out baskets or a slide-out wire shelf to access stored food easily. The downside – if the power goes out, an upright freezer will spoil faster than a chest freezer. 

Frost-free Freezer 

Most freezers today are frost-free, but you need to understand how they work, so it doesn’t affect your meal prepped foods. A frost-free freezer keeps the frost away by allowing the temperature to go up once a day to 32 F degrees instead of keeping your food cold at 0 F degrees. The frost-free design’s rising temperature keeps your food below freezing but warm enough to keep moisture in the air from condensing into ice. You won’t get a buildup of frost, so you’ll have more room, but you may get freezer-burned food. Frost-free freezers are also more expensive to operate than traditional freezers and worse for the environment since they take more electricity. If you want to bypass any freezer burn concerns, rotate your meal prepped foods and consume them regularly.

If these benefits feel worth the purchase, or you’re already considering buying a freezer, Progressive Leasing offers simple, flexible payment options from over 30,000 retailers. Find a store near you and discover your perfect upgrade by visiting our website at progleasing.com.