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.

If a Sim tries to open the fridge without any money, a sad trombone jingle will play, and the following message will appear: "Stomach growling? No §§, no food in fridge. Get some money and the refrigerator will miraculously refill and your sims can stuff their faces."

The Sims 2
Refrigerators in The Sims 2 ship with a full food supply. Sims can be instructed to prepare meals or obtain snacks from the refrigerator. As the supply of food is used up, a family member must top up its contents manually, either at a grocery store or by ordering it over the phone or computer. 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. Refrigerators can also be restocked for free by enabling the testing cheats, shift-clicking on them, and selecting the "Restock" option.

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.

If babies or toddlers are present on the lot, refrigerators will have an additional interaction to obtain baby bottles from them. If a high chair is present, Sims can also obtain proper baby food for toddlers seated in them.

Sims who are hungry and sloppy may autonomously stuff their face with food in front of the refrigerator. Pregnant Sims are more likely to do this. In Nightlife, Sims can be told to juggle bottles from any refrigerator, which will increase their fun motive. Playful Sims may do this autonomously. Sims may also autonomously play with the refrigerator doors, though this appears to be uncommon.

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

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 previous games, the option to prepare a meal will be greyed out if there are no preparation surfaces on the lot.

Items can be placed into and taken out of the refrigerator in a similar fashion to adding and removing items from the inventory. Food and ingredients can simply be dragged into the refrigerator by the player. The inventory of the refrigerator can be viewed by selecting the "Open" command, and items can be dragged into and out of the refrigerator in this manner as well. Although Sims no longer have to approach a refrigerator in order to get food and ingredients from it, they will still do so if instructed to get food or make meals.

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
Refrigerators function like those in The Sims, where refrigerators are fully stocked and Sims are charged whenever they cook a new meal. Sims are also able to choose between one, four, or eight servings made for each meal made from the refrigerator. Refrigerators can store leftovers, but they will spoil if not completely consumed after a few days. Sims need to clear the refrigerator of empty plates as they will also spoil in there.

Refrigerators can now break, which will cause puddles to form around it. It will then need to be repaired by a Sim or replaced. 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.

Cats can jump onto a 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.