I don't know if they are better (can't see how) but I love my upright. I hate the chest kind for all the reasons you mentioned. Besides they take up alot more room.

Chest freezers are, all other things being equal, more energy efficient. When you open an upright, all the cold are falls out (cold air being heavier than warm). With a chest freezer, the cold air stays put when it is opened.

They are a pain to reach into tho'.

I have had both over the years and though I agree the Chest freezer is supposed to be more energy efficient without doubt the time it took to find anything I am sure depleted the efficiency.

the energy efficient reason makes sense, but so does your point eahdhl, I can just imagine my ample backside sticking out of the chest freezer for long periods of time while I rummage for last season's pecans.

We have an upright freezer in our basement and it's really easy to take stuff out of it. I had debated between that and a chest freezer (mainly because I think they were cheaper) but even my cheapskate self will NEVER go back now. It is so much easier to access everything and I can organize just by sticking things on different shelves. Most of our freezer is for the dogs' food, so it's much easier for DH to know which shelves are "safe" than to have to inspect frozen hunks of stuff.

Of course I'm not the most tidy person in the world so ease of organization is important.

Betty, thanks for posting that question. It's one that my husband and I are in the midst of debating right now. Our chest freezer is probably more than 30 years old. It's only been used for about 20 of those 30 years, though. I'm not much on leaning into it, and it really takes some doing to keep from losing stuff at the bottom of it. Sometimes I'd love an upright. At the same time, I know it's more energy efficient (even a 30 year old model) than an upright. So I've dealt with that over the years.

DonnaR/CA

I have had both. I like an upright better but I can cram more stuff into a chest freezer. And with the chest, nothing has ever tumbled out and landed on my bare tootsies. ;-)

Definitely go with the upright! The newer uprights are more energy efficient. Even if the chest saves more energy, the food you waste that you forget about down in the deep cavern and never eat would off set the savings. Maybe it's just me, I am pretty short (5'2") and have (as my husband calls it...) alligator arms.

I LOVE my upright and go into it almost daily.

I'm in the process of making the same decision. My 20 yr old Kenmore chest freezer stayed with the home I sold. It had a system of baskets which moved along a track and made it easier to access everything. The thing is that with a chest freezer you can leave it open for a fairly long time while you're looking and organizing without loosing a ton of energy. So far I haven't seen anything new in a chest that is as convenient. Unless I can find something comparable, I may switch to an upright.

I went through this same decision recently. I knew about the efficiency benefit of the chest kind, and would have been willing to go that way. But I discovered that none of the chest freezers I could find were self defrosting. And there was no way I was going to defrost the freezer, especially in a basement that has no running water or drain. So I ended up with an upright.

neeter - its not just you. I'm 5'6 with (as DH puts it) gorilla arms, but there is still no way I'm going bottoms up to search for something in a chest freezer. I'm all for efficiency, but as someone upthread said, the additional time it would take for me to find anything would undo any cost savings. Plus in our house I *know* that it would become another horizontal surface to put things on. I'd have to unload it before I could open it!

We've got an upright and I love it! I wouldn't have a chest freezer, ever. This way is so easy, just like getting milk out of a fridge.

BTW, our old freezer (the kind you had to defrost) never did break after more than 20 years of use, so when Hurricane Rita hit, I said, that's it! It smells funny and we're getting a new one - frost free! Dh never even batted an eye. ;)

Susan

The only time I'd go with a chest freezer is if it's in your laundry and you need the extra 'counter' space of the freezer top.

Am I remembering incorrectly, or can chest freezers be kept at a lower temperature (deep freeze) than an upright? I want to avoid a freezer with an automatic defrost if possible (believe it or not), because the auto-defrost works by raising the temp on a regular cycle just enough to do the defrosting. Frozen foods don't keep as well for longer periods of time when the temp cycles up and down that much.

I don't think you want self defrosting. Freezers that self defrost do not keep food as long. My father has had the same (huge) non-self defrosting chest freezer for 30+ years. Nothing gets freezer burned in the thing. I don't know the temp it is at, but the stuff is frozen much harder than a regular freezer.