Meat: How Long It Keeps in the Fridge & Freezer

Meat runs the tightest fridge clock in the house, and the split is by cut rather than by animal: ground meat and variety meats go first, whole cuts — steaks, chops, roasts — hold noticeably longer, and the freezer stretches every one of them into months. The smoked and processed half, bacon through hot dogs and ham, plays by a different rule, where whether the package is still sealed changes the answer more than what’s inside it. A few items are shelf-stable until you open them — jerky, canned ham, retort pouches — and then join everything else in the fridge. Most pages here also carry USDA’s safe minimum cooking temperature, which is the number that settles doneness.