Are Fridges Safe Next to Sinks?

Not everyone is a good cook that’s well versed in how things should or shouldn’t be inside a kitchen. The layout of a room heavily influences activities, and homeowners may need to adjust to meet new demands. The question now is if an adjustment, such as putting a fridge next to a sink, is safe for your home. 

It is safe to put a fridge next to a sink as long as there are measures in place that prevent water from splashing onto the fridge or its outlet. Putting up barriers, changing sink orientation or fridge orientation, and the general layout of your kitchen are ways that you can make putting your fridge next to your sink safer. 

As always, there will be some extra things that you’ll need to know about before you can go ahead and redesign your kitchen. A few aspects of the different parts of your kitchen need to be reconsidered to be more usable and help you get the most bang out of your buck for your kitchen. 

Should you put a Fridge Next to your Sink? 

In most scenarios, it isn’t ideal to put a sink right next to your fridge. Sinks are usually closer to cooking areas to make it easier to prepare ingredients and clean cooking areas after.  

Fridges are used to store food, and in some cases to also “cook” food for certain dishes. There seems to be no practical reason why you would need to put a sink next to your fridge unless you have a particular case with your kitchen’s layout. 

You also need to consider the different utilities that these two rely on. Fridges run on electricity, consuming quite a considerable amount, while sinks always need an ample water supply. Potentially exposing your fridge to water can end up causing short-circuits and end up breaking your fridge. 

When Should you put a Fridge Next to your Sink? 

There are many reasons as to why you would need to put a sink right next your fridge. 

If your fridge needs a water source, then it’s probably a good idea to put it close to your sink. Having water fixtures close to each other is efficient as it helps cut down costs and makes repairs easier.

The best way to have a sink next to your fridge is to be aware of the orientation of the other things that are usually on the counter beside a sink(such as your dishwasher or a prepping counter). Architectural programming dictates that ideally a layout should be designed around the user’s activities rather than the user adjusting to the space. 

How to Put a Fridge Next to your Sink? 

This topic can be an entire article by itself but we think it’s a good idea to give you a brief overview so you have an idea of what to expect from this type of project. Firstly, you wanna make sure that you have enough space for everything to fit. It’s best to plan out everything by taking measurements of the part of your kitchen you want to fit with a fridge and a sink. 

• The type of measurements you should take is the length of the wall, the depth of the counter and your fridge, the dimensions of your sink(including where you place dishwashers, soaps, etc.), and the workspace you’ll be needing. 

• From there, you’ll want to plan out your utilities. Where you want to have your outlet located and where you want to have your pipes entering in. Take note that the cabinet underneath your sink should be reserved to house your pipes so that your sink can easily be repaired in case anything goes wrong. 

• It’s also advisable to make sure that there is some clearance between your sink and your fridge, enough so that when you lean forward to use your sink, you’ll have enough space to work with. You don’t want to end up washing your plates at an angle just because your fridge is in the way. 

• Also remember that for a sink, you’ll need to put drainage on your floor. This entails installing a new drain pipe and connecting it to your current waste pipes and that floor’s cleanout. It’s not required to do this but it will go a long way in helping you clean your kitchen. 

• Lastly, you should also consider the design of the fridge. Double door fridges take up quite a lot of space, and in general, the orientation of your fridge should be so that it is not blocking other parts of your kitchen when used. If you have a smaller kitchen, you might want to consider using a smaller fridge. If you want to make a  larger fridge work, we suggest that you try a different layout where the fridge is located at the edge of your kitchen to prevent it from hindering anything else. 

These are the general considerations, in relation to kitchen safety, when putting a sink next to your fridge. 

How To Make A Fridge And Sink Compatible With One Another?

You’re going to want to put up a barrier between your fridge and sink to prevent any water from damaging your fridge. You can do this by setting up a barrier, such as the ones set up in restaurants nowadays, to reduce COVID transmissions’ chances to prevent any fluids from getting through. A sturdy thin-plastic barrier bolted into the edge of the counter that your sink is on should do the trick for this. 

Another thing you need to consider is having your fridge’s outlet fitted with a GCFI system if it hasn’t yet. GCFI is a safety feature in electrical outlets that shuts down the circuit if anything goes wrong and helps protect your appliances from breaking.

Lastly, the rest of your kitchen’s layout will have to adjust to this change. Having your cooking area and prep area somewhat closer to your sink will be needed as these two often rely on having a sink nearby for them to be usable. 

Conclusion

It is safe to put a fridge next to a sink. The only thing that you need to worry about is if water can reach the sensitive parts of your fridge and reach an outlet. This sort of setup is considered unusual, as most kitchens are often designed with specific programming built into it already that dictates where one should do different activities.