Refrigerator

In The Sims Series, a refrigerator is an appliance Sims can take food from. Beginning with The Sims 2: Seasons, Sims can also store leftover food in refrigerators to eat later.

The Sims
In The Sims the household loses an amount of money each time a Sim takes food from their refrigerator, but refrigerators are always full unless the household has no more money left to buy the food they want. The quality of the refrigerator affects how satisfying a meal is; more expensive refrigerators will produce more satisfying meals.

The Sims 2
Refrigerators in The Sims 2 ship with a full food supply. As the food in a refrigerator is used, a family member must top up its contents manually, either at a grocery store or by home delivery. Home delivery can be initiated by phone, computer, or by clicking on the refrigerator and checking the amount of supplies left. Each unit of food costs §2, though food bought from a Sim-owned business may cost more. Sims will usually put groceries in the refrigerator, but may put them on a counter or other surface. If this happens, the player can click on the basket and select "Put Away". If a Sim bought groceries from more than one display, whether in a business or on a normal community lot, there will be a basket for each display the Sim bought from. However, only the first basket will automatically be put away or put down; others will have to be removed from the Sim's inventory and put away. While buying from multiple displays, especially in a business, adds a touch of realism, there is no other reason to do it.

Starting with Seasons, refrigerators can store leftovers, which will stay good indefinitely. Seasons also allows refrigerators to be stocked with produce, which will also keep indefinitely.

Refrigerators on community lots do not need to be stocked, but Sims will be charged every time they take food from them, much like in The Sims. A secret society will be charged whenever its refrigerator is used, but the refrigerator will always be fully stocked. Also, the food supply of a refrigerator in a dormitory cafeteria will not diminish when food is made by the cafeteria attendant, but will diminish when dorm residents take food from it. Likewise, in an owned business, businesses will be charged whenever a Sim takes food from a refrigerator on the lot.

All refrigerators in The Sims 2 have the same hunger value, but the more expensive models will hold more food than the cheaper ones. If a refrigerator is stocked with produce, foods cooked with it will have a higher hunger value.

The Sims 3
In The Sims 3, ingredients can be bought, caught, or grown, and stored in a refrigerator for the household to use. If an ingredient that's needed to cook a meal is missing from both the refrigerator and the Sim's inventory, the Sim will be charged for the ingredient at a higher cost and of lower quality than if they purchased it from the grocery store.

Unlike The Sims 2, in which leftovers never spoil, leftovers will eventually spoil in The Sims 3, and the quality/price of the refrigerator has an impact on how long leftovers can be stored before spoiling. Spoiled meals can be cleaned out of the refrigerator by Sims or the maid. Spoiled food in a refrigerator will give Sims the "Disgusted" moodlet.

Unlike The Sims 2, food stored in the fridges are shared across all fridges on the lot and are not tied to each individual fridge. For example, if the player first deletes a fridge and then buys a new one, the new fridge will have all the food that was in the old fridge. Also, if there are multiple fridges on the lot, they all have the same contents; removing one item from one fridge removes it from all of the other fridges. The rate that food spoils depends on the fridge with the lowest quality. With patch 55, if a household owns multiple homes in one world, fridges on these lots share the same food inventory as well.

The Sims 4
Players do not need to send their Sims to grocery lots or have food delivered as refrigerators are stocked automatically. Instead, Sims are charged each time they wish to cook a new meal, similarly to refrigerators in The Sims. Sims can choose to cook most meals with either one, four, or eight servings.

Refrigerators can store leftovers, even if they came from other lots or Sims, but they will still spoil if not completely consumed after a few days. Sims need to clear the refrigerator of empty plates as they will also spoil there. As in The Sims 3, if a lot's refrigerator is replaced, all food stored in the old refrigerator will be carried over to the new refrigerator.

The Sims 2 (Console)
In The Sims 2 series for consoles, meals must be created by combining ingredients, and cheaper refrigerators give fewer ingredient options than more expensive ones. The only way to obtain ingredients would be to grow them, to harvest them from a fish tank, or to purchase them directly from the refrigerator. Each ingredient is priced differently and affects bladder and hunger urgencies differently.