The Maytag MRFF4236RZ is a mid-range 36-inch standard-depth French door refrigerator. It has a fairly basic design overall, with an inverter-controlled compressor, a single evaporator design, and no through-door water and ice dispenser. Its interior is highly reconfigurable, featuring a quartet of split shelves and door bins with numerous alternative positions for accommodating taller items.
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Our Verdict
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ is great for general everyday use. Despite its basic single evaporator design, it does a great job of keeping delicate produce crisp and fresh when stored inside the crisper drawers. It also has excellent temperature uniformity, so you don't have to be overly tactical when unpacking your groceries. Overall, the capacity is decent for the most part. Although its fridge cabinet isn't the largest on the market for a fridge of this type, it's highly customizable, featuring four movable shelves and a plethora of door bin positions. Unfortunately, its freezer cabinet is quite shallow, making it difficult to fit larger boxed items inside.
Highly customizable fridge storage.
Good overall temperature uniformity performance in fridge.
Produce stored inside crisper drawers still retains moisture for relatively long periods.
Single-evaporator design results in low humidity inside the fridge cabinet.
Fridge cabinet's overall volume is slightly less than that of alternatives.
Freezer capacity is low for a unit of this size, even with the ice tray removed.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ's produce preservation performance is impressive, especially for a fridge with this kind of cooling system. This is a single-evaporator fridge, and as a result, its fridge cabinet is somewhat on the drier side, which can have a negative impact on produce preservation. That said, delicate greens like celery or spinach stored inside its crisper drawer still retain their moisture over time, and you shouldn't begin to see wilting until well over a week.
Produce stored inside crisper drawers still retains moisture for relatively long periods.
Single-evaporator design results in low humidity inside the fridge cabinet.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ has good capacity in its refrigerator. The fridge compartment is slightly smaller in terms of usable volume compared to some other standard-depth 36-inch models, but the space itself is highly reconfigurable, featuring a quartet of split shelves and multiple door bin positions. The latter are big enough to easily accommodate bulky items like gallon jugs of milk or juice, as there's no in-door water and ice dispenser to get in the way.
Highly customizable fridge storage.
Fridge cabinet's overall volume is slightly less than that of alternatives.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ's freezer capacity is only passable. The space itself is short and not especially deep, especially for a standard-depth 36-inch unit. The upper pull-out drawer is really quite small, even with the ice tray removed, and the lower bins don't offer tremendous capacity either. You'll likely need to do some serious reorganizing after a grocery run if you're shopping for a big family, potentially having to remove prepackaged food from its box to carve out a bit of extra room.
Freezer capacity is low for a unit of this size, even with the ice tray removed.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ exhibits excellent overall temperature uniformity performance. You can place items like yogurt or sour cream wherever it's most practical for you, as you won't have to worry about items not being cooled to a sufficient degree or, conversely, getting frozen. The middle and upper door bins do trend a little warmer than the rest of the cabinet, but not by enough to result in premature spoilage in temperature-sensitive items like cream or milk. Freezer temperature uniformity is exceptional, with temperatures varying by only a slight degree from top to bottom bins.
Good overall temperature uniformity performance in fridge.
Freezer temperatures are highly uniform.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ's ice-making performance is very good. It can produce enough ice for serving drinks at a smaller family gathering, accommodating four to six people, approximately. Filling its ice tray to peak capacity gives you a little more to work with, though if you're serving drinks for a party with 10 or more people, you might want to consider buying a bag of ice or filling a separate container well in advance.
Ice production rate is sufficient for smaller get-togethers.
Performance Usages
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Differences Between Sizes And Variants
This fridge is only available in one color variant: 'Stainless Steel'. For those interested, here's our test unit's product label.
Let us know in the discussions below if you come across another variant of this refrigerator.
Popular Refrigerator Comparisons
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ is a mid-range 36-inch French door refrigerator. It excels in the basics, with very good overall temperature consistency in both its fridge and freezer cabinets, and strong produce preservation performance, outperforming alternatives like the Bosch 100 Series B36FD10ENS in both regards, despite its basic cooling system. That said, while its interior cabinet is highly reconfigurable, with a multitude of shelf and door bin positions, it offers less capacity than other 36-inch French door models, such as the Samsung Bespoke RF30BB6200QL and GE Profile PGE29BYTFS. That holds doubly true when considering its overall lack of freezer storage space compared to those aforementioned alternatives.
If you're looking for an alternative, see our recommendations for the best refrigerator brands, the best refrigerators, and the best French door refrigerators.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ and Samsung Bespoke RF30BB6200QL are both evenly matched standard-depth French door refrigerators, though they do have slightly different strengths. The Maytag employs a simpler single-evaporator, fixed-speed compressor cooling system design to achieve comparable product preservation and temperature uniformity to the Samsung, which uses a more complex cooling system comprising dual evaporators and an inverter-controlled compressor. While simplicity isn't a guarantee of reliability, it does present fewer failure points. Beyond that, the Maytag's ejector-style ice maker is less likely to break due to long-term wear than the Samsung's dual twist-tray ice makers, although the latter setup does have a higher yield. It's also worth noting that the Samsung provides a noticeable amount of extra room in its fridge and freezer cabinets versus the Maytag.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ is a better-performing fridge than the Samsung RF32CG5400SR. The Maytag delivers superior temperature uniformity inside the fridge, although both units perform similarly in this regard within the freezer. Additionally, it does a significantly better job of keeping delicate produce crisp and fresh. That said, the Samsung has the edge in terms of overall capacity, with far more room in its freezer and fridge compartments than the Maytag.
The GE Profile PGE29BYTFS is a slightly better-performing fridge than the Maytag MRFF4236RZ overall. The GE has a larger fridge compartment with a separate temperature-controlled drawer, making it easier to organize big grocery runs, and its freezer has more room to boot. The GE also features an inverter-controlled compressor, which does a slightly better job of maintaining uniform temperatures in its fridge cabinet. If you regularly host large numbers of people, both units have ejector-style ice makers. However, the GE can output more ice in a 24-hour period, and its ice tray has a greater overall capacity. With all that being said, the Maytag's simpler design, which includes a cooling system with a fixed-speed compressor and single evaporator, introduces fewer obvious failure points, all the while delivering comparable produce preservation performance.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ is a better-performing fridge than the Bosch 100 Series B36FD10ENS. The Maytag provides superior temperature uniformity in both the fridge and freezer cabinets, and it does a better job of keeping delicate produce, such as celery, spinach, or lettuce, crisp and fresh when stored in its crisper drawers. However, the Bosch does provide more room inside its refrigerator and freezer compartments, making it easier to fit bulky items. Unlike the Maytag, it also has an in-door water and ice dispenser. While the latter is a boon for convenience, it is worth noting that ice makers are traditionally one of the first components to fail in modern fridges. The Maytag's freezer-mounted ice maker presents fewer failure points, as there's no need for the fridge to maintain a stable, independent freezing microclimate to create ice.
Test Results
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ provides a good amount of space inside the fridge compartment. It's a slightly narrower and shorter space than other standard-depth models, like the GE Profile PGE29BYTFS, but it's highly reconfigurable, with four split shelves that have a multitude of mounting positions, making it easier to fit taller or bulky items inside. The crisper bins and full-width deli drawer are a tad on the short end, though, which can make it difficult to stack larger produce inside.
On the other hand, the six door bins are impressively wide and deep, which makes sense as there's no bulky water and ice dispenser to get in the way.
Freezer capacity is unfortunately only acceptable. The lower wire-rack bins aren't especially deep or wide, making it a struggle to fit family-sized packs of frozen meals. Meanwhile, the upper drawer is mainly suitable for smaller items, such as smaller bags of frozen fruit or vegetables. Removing the ice tray frees up a tiny bit of additional space, with the usable freezer volume increasing by roughly 9%, to 3.27 cu. ft. (92.6 L).
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ has a fairly simple cooling system that consists of a single evaporator in the freezer and a single fixed-speed compressor. The latter is somewhat unusual for a fridge in this price range, as many alternatives feature inverter-controlled compressors that, on paper, provide superior energy efficiency and temperature control. That said, in the real world, these advantages aren't always pronounced, and fixed-speed compressors' lower degree of complexity introduces fewer obvious weaknesses.
This refrigerator has an ejector-style ice maker in its freezer. The latter is optimal placement as far as ice makers are concerned, as there's no need for the fridge to maintain a stable microclimate. Ejector-style ice makers also present fewer obvious weak points than twist-tray style ice makers, with the plastic molds in the latter being susceptible to cracking or breaking over time due to repeated thermal and mechanical stress. Instead, ejector-style units have a metal mold to form the ice, while a separate element heats this mold to release the ice into the tray below.
This refrigerator has a button-activated water dispenser on the inside of the fridge cabinet, allowing you to refill a glass without having to remove a separate full-sized water pitcher from the refrigerator. This design saves space compared to external water dispensers, but it can be a little inconvenient, requiring you to open your fridge for a quick refill if you're accustomed to the former.
Temperature uniformity inside the refrigerator compartment is good overall. There isn't too massive a difference in temperature from the top to the bottom shelf, and you won't have to worry about items like milk or cream spoiling prematurely, depending on where you place them. The middle and upper door bins trend a few degrees warmer than the warmest shelf, but still not by a degree sufficient to have a significant impact on food preservation.
It's worth noting that the Maytag MRFF4236RZ has a Max Cool setting, which lowers the temperature setpoint to the lowest setting for 24 hours to quickly cool any groceries you need to have chilled in a hurry.
Freezer temperature uniformity is exceptional. There's effectively no noticeable difference in temperature between the top and bottom drawers, so feel free to place items wherever it's convenient.
Unusually for a single-evaporator fridge, the Maytag MRFF4236RZ's produce preservation performance is great. Its performance is something of an outlier in this respect: humidity in the crisper drawer is distinctly average, and yet produce stored inside retains a higher degree of moisture than units with higher surrounding humidity.
As is expected for a single-evaporator unit, humidity in the fridge compartment is quite low, and you shouldn't expect produce to remain crisp outside the confines of the crisper drawers for very long.
This refrigerator's ice production rate is good. It produces enough ice for a four or five-person dinner, but for everything larger than that, you'll want to start filling the ice tray a few days in advance.
The Maytag MRFF4236RZ's ice tray has very good capacity. Once filled, it can supply enough ice for a moderately sized party, though if you're hosting a party and serving drinks for more than eight or nine people, it's best to buy a bag of ice.