Verdict
Costing a lot less than much of the competition, the large side-by-side Hisense RS818N4TFE fridge freezer doesn’t look noticeably cheaper. It has some neat features, too, including a frost-free interior and a non-plumbed ice and water dispenser. The fridge ran a touch hotter than the set temperature, but that’s my only complaint.
Pros
- Lots of space
- Excellent temperature control
- Neat non-plumbed water dispenser
Cons
- Runs a little warm in the fridge
Key Features
-
CapacityThis fridge freezer has 417-litres of fridge space and 215-litres of freezer space, for a total of 632-litres. That’s plenty for very large families. -
Water dispenserNon-plumbed water dispenser can output cold water, or crushed or cubed ice.
Introduction
Big American-style fridge freezers tend to come with a price that’s just as big. The Hisense RS818N4TFE is different, as it’s a cheaper option.
That doesn’t mean that it lacks features: the premium black design looks great, and the non-plumbed ice and water dispenser are easy to set up and use.
Design and features
- Neat matt black design
- Non-plumbed ice and water dispenser
- Clever internal layout
The Hisense RS818N4TFE is about as big as a side-by fridge freezer gets in the UK, with a total capacity of 632-litres, split between the 215-litre freezer and the 632-litre fridge. That’s a similar size overall to the LG GSXV90MCDE. The big difference is in the price, with the Hisense RS818N4TFE costing less than half of the LG model.
Not that Hisense has noticeably cut costs to get the Hisense RS818N4TFE down to this price point. From the outside, this fridge freezer looks as good as any other model that I’ve reviewed, with its completely flat face and matt black finish. It’s a premium finish that will look good in pretty much any kitchen.
On the front, the only thing breaking the design is the water and ice dispenser, offering touch buttons to choose between crushed or cubed ice, or chilled water.
Rather than being plumbed in, the Hisense RS818N4TFE instead uses a large 4.5-litre water tank that can be refilled. While there’s a certain amount of effort involved in keeping the water topped up, it does mean that the Hisense RS818N4TFE can go anywhere and doesn’t need to be within reach of a cold-water tap.
Of course, the downside is that the Hisense RS818N4TFE doesn’t produce filtered water. If you want filtered water, you could have the InSinkErator 4N1 Touch tap installed, which has a filtered water button.
Inside, the Hisense RS818N4TFE is well laid out. Inside the fridge section next to the water dispenser is a pull-out Snack box, which is handy for storing those little items that tend to get lost on shelves. It’s just a drawer and doesn’t have fancy tech, such as the vacuum compartment on the Hitachi R-WB640VGB1.
There’s a drinks rack underneath, which uses a solid shelf with grooves in it to stop bottles from rolling. This is slightly more flexible than a traditional bottle rack, as you can vary how many bottles you can store: more thinner ones; fewer wider ones.
There are then three traditional shelves, and two drawers (none with humidity controls). Shelves are well spaced, and there’s room on the top shelf to stand up a 2-pint milk container.
There are three large door pockets. Each is big enough to take a 4-litre milk container and taller items, such as bottles. Or you can fill them up with soda cans, with space to stack them two deep.
Flip open the freezer section, and there are five shelves, each wide enough to take a supermarket frozen pizza. The shelves at the top aren’t quite as deep as the ones at the bottom because the ice holder and dispenser take up room; that’s always the case with water-dispensing fridge freezers, plumbed or not.
Two drawers at the bottom are large and hold items that might spill, such as frozen chips or peas.
There are also two useful door pockets, easily big enough to hold a couple of boxes of fish fingers or some ice creams.
Bright LED lighting throughout the fridge freezer mean that it’s easy to find something, even if the lighting around you is poor.
There’s a front control panel that let me set the temperature of the fridge and freezer independently. As per my usual tests, I set these to 4°C for the fridge and -18°C for the freezer.
Performance
- Very stable temperatures
- A touch warmer than the set temperature in the fridge
- Competitive power consumption
To see how well the fridge freezer did, I loaded it up with ice packs and put some temperature sensors in. I also used our custom-made door opener, which opens and closes the fridge door at regular intervals.
Measuring the fridge, the average temperature was 5.72°C, which is 1.72°C higher than the set temperature of 4°C. The maximum temperature that I recorded was 7.7°C at the top, with a minimum of 3.5°C.
Standard deviation showed that most temperatures were, on average, +/-0.56°C from the average. That shows that the fridge maintains its temperature well without wild fluctuations. However, as the measured temperature was quite high, I’d be tempted to knock the thermostat of this model down a degree.
In the freezer, things were better. On average, the freezer temperature was -19°C, just 1°C different from the target temperature. The warmest that the fridge got was -12.5°C, dropping to a cold low of -25.1°C. On average, standard deviation showed that temperatures were mostly +/- 0.86°C from the average. Anything below 1°C fluctuation is excellent.
This is an E-rated appliance, with an energy label that states it uses 346kWh per year. At a unit cost of 34p per kWh that works out to a yearly running cost of £117.64 or 0.19p per litre. That’s about average for a large fridge freezer of this kind.
I took my own power measurements over the two-week testing period. Based on my settings, the fridge freezer would use 237kWh, dropping the running cost to a cheaper £80.75 per year.
This is a frost-free model, and I detected no frost build up during my testing time.
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Should you buy it?
You want a big fridge freezer: This side-by-side model is huge with plenty of capacity for the largest families, plus it has some neat features for the price, including a water and ice dispenser.
You want more features or cheaper running costs: Spend more on the competition and you can get some extra features, such as humidity adjustable drawers, and slightly better temperature management.
Final Thoughts
If you want an American-style fridge freezer but don’t want to pay the more premium prices for features such as plumbed-in water dispensing and humidity-adjustable model, then the Hisense RS818N4TFE is an excellent value alternative.
I’d knock the fridge temperature down a degree to get closer to the 4°C that I normally set, but otherwise, this is a great choice for those that want a large fridge freezer. Check out my guide to the best fridge freezers for alternatives.
How we test
Unlike other sites, we test every fridge freezer we review thoroughly over an extended period of time. We use industry standard tests to compare features properly. We’ll always tell you what we find. We never, ever, accept money to review a product.
Find out more about how we test in our ethics policy.
We test for at least two weeks.
We use temperature sensors to monitor the internal temperature to help us accurately compare models from different manufacturers.
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FAQs
There’s a 4.5-litre water tank in the fridge that has to be filled up.
Yes, this model is frost free in the fridge and freezer section.
Trusted Reviews test data
Sustainability
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As part of this mission, whenever we review a product, we send the company a series of questions to help us gauge and make transparent the impact the device has on the environment
We currently haven’t received answers to the questions on this product, but we will update this page the moment we do. You can see a detailed breakdown of the questions we ask and why in our sustainability info page.
