Refrigerators are nothing new in the automotive world, but before the recent boom in portable power stations, there wasn’t much demand for them outside of RVs and long-haul truckers. At $400, Bodega Cooler’s car refrigerator undercuts many established mobile fridge makers like Dometic by as much as $1,000 without sacrificing essential features like the responsive touch interface, clear temperature readouts, and sturdy build quality. While Bodega Cooler also offers options for #VanLife setups, short day trips, and everything in between, the focus today is on its 64-quart offering with a dual-zone fridge/freezer system.

We’ve already mentioned the benefits of power stations, especially during disasters and unexpected blackouts, but they can be just as crucial during planned power outages, like when camping or tailgating. Most power stations worth their salt can easily charge your phone and laptop, and still have plenty of juice left over for more demanding modern conveniences. Bodega Cooler’s car fridge fits that niche perfectly. A direct replacement for a cooler full of ice, it’ll still keep your goods cold, all without the risk of melting ice seeping into your sandwich bags and giving you a soggy surprise later.

Price, availability and specifications

Sizes for every budget

The Bodega Cooler Car Fridge line offers a variety of sizes ranging from $300 to $700, mostly just in this blue and gray color scheme. The 64-quart version we’re featuring today is priced at $400 and is occasionally available for as little as $300, but depending on your use case, you may be more interested in the 80- and 32-quart versions.

What is good about the Bodega Cooler car refrigerator?

Still a good value at this price

While the $400 price tag may seem a little high for those who haven’t been camping in a while, it’s worth noting that the Bodega Cooler 64-Quart Car Fridge normally costs just $25 more than Yeti’s 65 qt Tundra cooler. It has virtually the same capacity and price as a premium cooler, plus it features a split cooling unit that keeps you from leaving camp to get more ice, so it’s going to be hard to choose a traditional cooler over it.

One of the great features is the split fridge/freezer. The divider in the middle can be removed and the Bodega Cooler will automatically disable the freeze control and operate in single zone cooling mode. The racks are also removable, making it much easier to put long ribs or brisket in. Removing the racks also gives you access to the drain plug on the fridge side, which is necessary for removing ice since it is not frost free. This also makes it easy to pre-fill the fridge side with neatly nested layers of cans.

As anyone with a freezer or traditional cooler will know, placing the lid of your chosen cooler on top rather than the front is an easy way to keep that hard-earned cold air inside. This makes maintaining the temperature much easier when you open the box frequently. What makes the Bodega Cooler so suitable for its task is not only this well-known thermodynamic principle, but also the fact that it is coupled with a cooling system that uses virtually no power. In our tests, we found it used between 20 and 50 watt-hours of power when it started up, followed by longer periods of almost zero power consumption while it was idle between cooling cycles.

This minimal power consumption makes it perfect for most small to medium-sized power stations. Connected to a Jackery Explorer 1000, it was estimated to provide over a day’s worth of power on this duty cycle, which can easily be extended by combining it with one or two solar panels. If you get two of Jackery’s 200W panels, two hours in the sun can provide a full day’s worth of cooling, so you can easily stay off the grid for weeks as long as you still have have Keep food cool.

Even without a constant power supply, the Bodega Cooler Despite it well-insulated and frozen Gatorade bottles stored inside were still cold and slushy two days later. However, given the low power draw and the large amount of space inside, it’s hardly surprising how long it takes to reach rated temperature. From room temperature, the refrigerator side took nearly six hours to reach 35 degrees Fahrenheit, and Bodega Cooler recommends a day and a half for things stored in the freezer to freeze. This problem is easily solved by plugging the refrigerator into an outlet a day or two before you leave for camping, so it’s not a problem.

What’s bad about the Bodega Cooler car refrigerator?

Not as smart as it pretends

By far the most frustrating issue with the Bodega Cooler Car Fridge is the (mostly) unreliable app experience. While I wouldn’t necessarily call controlling the fridge via phone a desperate need, it’s one of the features I’d rather not have than a lackluster version of it. Given the choice of spending another 30 minutes connecting my Pixel 8 Pro to the Bodega Cooler and walking over to press the buttons in real life, I prefer the latter option.

Compared to the aforementioned Yeti Tundra 65, the Bodega Cooler Car Fridge is 2-3 inches shorter in the X and Y dimensions, but 6 inches taller (21.5 inches) and weighs 15 pounds more when empty—50% more than the Yeti. In its defense, it more or less contains the innards of a dorm fridge, so it’s not worth losing points. And the extra weight is unlikely to matter when it’s fully loaded and being rolled around.

Much like the college dorm fridge mentioned above, the Bodega Cooler Car Fridge is not frost-free. While it doesn’t require ice to keep your cans cool, a lot of it can build up inside over time. This is much less of an issue here since it has a drain on the bottom, making it much easier to maintain than your college beer stash. The big downside to this design compared to a traditional fridge is that it relies more on direct contact than blown-in conditioned air to cool its contents, resulting in much longer periods of time to chill or freeze whatever you put in it.

Should you buy it?

One of the first upgrades I would make

Aside from the extended cooling time and the considerable size, it is hard to deny the value proposition of the Bodega Cooler Car Fridge. With a traditional cooler, it is quite typical to end your weekend trip with a half-full cooler of lukewarm water and those ten diet Sunkisses that no one really wanted to drink. With the Bodega Cooler, however, you can Strictly speaking Take advantage of the space normally taken up by ice and head out into the wild with significantly more refreshments without taking up much more space.

The biggest concession here is that the Bodega Cooler works best if you already have a power plant and some solar panels to power it. If that’s the case, upgrading your off-grid activities like this is one of the first quality of life improvements I’d suggest.