Guide

How Long Do Eggs Last?

The carton says one thing, the fridge says another. Here's how long eggs actually last, how to decode the date on the carton, and when to trust the float test over the printed date.

You've done this: found a carton in the fridge with a date that passed last week, sniffed one egg, shrugged, and made the omelet anyway. Most of the time that gamble works out. Sometimes it doesn't. The honest answer to "how long do eggs last" is longer than the carton suggests — but only if you know what the date means and how to check the eggs yourself.

Let's start with the number most people actually want: refrigerated, in-shell eggs are typically good for three to five weeks past the date on the carton, assuming they've been kept cold the whole time. That's a wide window, and it exists because the printed date is mostly about inventory, not your breakfast. We're not a food-safety authority, so when an egg smells off or you're genuinely unsure, throw it out — a carton of eggs is never worth the gamble.

Decoding the date on the carton

Egg cartons in the US carry two things worth knowing: the sell-by or best-by date you already look at, and a Julian date most people have never noticed.

• Sell by / best by. Eggs are typically packed and dated, then given a 30-day window before the sell-by date appears on the shelf. This date is a quality guide for the store and for you — it is not the day the eggs go bad. Properly refrigerated eggs usually hold good eating quality for another three to five weeks past it.
• The Julian date. Look for a three-digit number near the sell-by date, like 254. That's the day of the year the eggs were packed — 254 means they were packed on September 11. This is the freshest evidence you have, and it's stamped on almost every US carton.
• The plant code. A code starting with P followed by numbers identifies the packing plant. Not useful for freshness at home, but it's how recalls are tracked — worth knowing when a recall notice crosses your feed.

So when you're deciding whether a carton is still good, the sell-by date is only a starting point. The pack date tells you the real age, and your own senses and a quick water test tell you the rest.

The float test, and what it actually tells you

The float test is the internet's favorite egg trick, and it's genuinely useful — as long as you know what it's measuring. As eggs age, air seeps through the shell and the air cell inside grows. Bigger air cell means more buoyancy. So:

• Sinks flat and stays down. Fresh egg, small air cell. Good for anything, including poaching.
• Stands on one end but stays down. Older but fine. The air cell has grown — ideal for hard-boiling, since they peel easily.
• Floats. Big air cell. The egg isn't necessarily rotten, but it's well past its prime. Crack it into a separate bowl and judge by smell before committing it to the pan.

What the float test does not tell you: whether the egg is contaminated. An egg that sinks can still be bad, and the classic advice still applies — if cracking it releases sulfur, or the white or yolk looks discolored or slimy, that egg is done regardless of what the water said.

Your nose remains the best tool in the kitchen. A bad egg announces itself the moment you crack it. Trust it.

Fridge, pantry, farm-fresh — where and how you store changes everything

In the US, commercial eggs are washed and refrigerated before they reach the store, and the washing removes the protective cuticle. Once washed, cold storage isn't optional anymore — a refrigerated egg left at room temperature for more than a couple of hours can sweat, and condensation opens the door for bacteria. Keep them in the main body of the fridge at 40°F (4°C) or below, not the door, where the temperature swings every time someone grabs the milk.

Unwashed farm-fresh eggs are a different animal. With the cuticle intact, they can sit at cool room temperature for a week or so, and they'll keep for weeks refrigerated. Many farm eggs are also days fresher than anything in a supermarket — they often hit your kitchen within a day or two of laying, versus the weeks a carton spends in packing, distribution, and retail.

The trade-off with farm-fresh eggs: a very fresh egg can sit in the fridge for months and still float in a glass of water without being spoiled. That's why dates and the float test work together — the float tells you the age, your nose and eyes tell you whether to use it.

Egg storage at a glance — realistic windows, not panic dates

Storage	How long eggs last	Notes
Refrigerated, in shell	3–5 weeks past sell-by	Keep in the coldest part, not the door
Countertop, unwashed farm egg	1–2 weeks	Cuticle intact; keep cool and out of sun
Cracked into a container	2–4 days refrigerated	Yolks break down fastest; use soon
Hard-boiled, in shell	1 week refrigerated	Peels easier when eggs are older
Frozen (whites, or beaten whole)	Up to 12 months	Never freeze in shell

Freezing eggs — the backup plan nobody uses enough

You cannot freeze eggs in the shell; they expand and crack. But eggs freeze beautifully once you beat them, and this is the move when a carton is aging faster than your breakfast plans. Whisk whole eggs together (a little salt or sugar per cup helps keep the texture from going grainy), pour into a freezer bag or ice cube tray, label the date, and freeze for up to a year. Egg whites freeze perfectly on their own. Yolks on their own thicken and gel unless you beat them with a pinch of salt or sugar first.

Thaw frozen eggs overnight in the fridge and use them fully cooked — scrambled, baked, in a frittata. Freezing is best for eggs you plan to cook rather than recipes where a picture-perfect yolk matters. For a deeper dive on freezing food safely, see our freezer storage guide.

The sell-by date on your receipt vs. the date in your head

Here's where honest egg math gets practical. Most people lose track of eggs not because the date is wrong but because they never had the date anywhere useful. The carton gets recycled, or the eggs migrate to a bowl, and three weeks later you're sniffing and hoping.

The system that works is boring: keep the newest cartons behind the older ones, write the pack date on the lid if you decant, and have one place where the current expiry window lives. When you scan your grocery receipt with ShelfLife, eggs land in your inventory with an estimated shelf-life window automatically, and you get a nudge before that window closes instead of a smell test at 7 a.m. The app's estimates come from a multi-provider AI cascade with automatic failover, backed by USDA-derived offline fallback data — the same guidance the government's own storage references use, applied to what you actually bought. If you want the broader picture of how AI estimates shelf life for everything in your fridge, we cover it in how AI estimates your food's true expiry date.

Farm-fresh vs. store-bought: which lasts longer?

Ask around at a farmers market and you'll hear that farm eggs last forever. Not quite — but unwashed eggs do keep longer at room temperature, and they usually start fresher. A supermarket carton may already be three to five weeks old at purchase, which is why the "3–5 weeks past the date" rule exists: it accounts for eggs that spent time in the supply chain before reaching your fridge.

The practical version: treat store-bought as perishable from the pack date, and treat unwashed farm eggs as perishable from the lay date. Both reward you for knowing when they entered your kitchen — which is exactly the kind of thing a receipt-scanning inventory does for you automatically, since every carton is dated the moment it's scanned.

Common egg questions, answered quickly

Do eggs go bad faster once you boil them?

Yes. Hard-boiled eggs last about a week refrigerated — shorter than raw — because boiling removes the protective coating on the shell. Keep them in the shell in the fridge until you eat them.

Is it safe to use eggs in recipes past the date?

Within a few weeks, if they've been refrigerated and pass the sniff and float checks, they're generally fine for baked goods and fully cooked dishes. When in doubt, throw it out.

Does the float test mean a floating egg is rotten?

Not necessarily. A floating egg is old, with a large air cell. Crack it into a bowl first and use your nose — but a floater is a reasonable candidate for the compost, not the pan.

Eggs are one of the most forgiving items in your kitchen, and one of the most commonly tossed on a technicality. Knowing the pack date, the float test, and your own nose covers 95 percent of the decisions. If you want the rest of your fridge held to the same standard, that's what ShelfLife does: one receipt scan builds your full inventory with realistic expiry windows, so nothing else in there gets to hide behind a mystery date either.