LG LSXC22436S Side-by-Side Counter-Depth Refrigerator review: This might be the best side-by-side fridge I've tested

If I were in the market for a side-by-side refrigerator, the LG LSXC22436S would be right at the top of my list. At a retail price of $2,099, LG's newest side-by-side model isn't anything flashy, but it offers efficient cooling and pitch-perfect performance -- specifically, temperatures that are extremely accurate and consistent from shelf to shelf. It's also less expensive than any of the counter-depth side-by-side refrigerators you'll find from key competitors like Samsung, GE and Whirlpool.

It's not an especially interesting design, and you won't find many features of note hidden inside apart from the on-board Wi-Fi radio that lets you sync it up with Alexa or the Google Assistant, then check things like the status of the water filter with a voice command (yawn). But if you're buying this fridge, it isn't because you're looking for the latest features -- it's because you want the best performance for the price. That's what this side-by-side offers, and that makes it a very worthy purchase.

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Ho-hum design

Clad in classic stainless steel, the boxy LSXC22436S won't do much to modernize your kitchen aesthetic. Instead, it's the sort of inoffensive appliance that's designed to blend in, which is a nice way of saying that it isn't much to look at. But the counter-depth build, which shaves a few inches off the front of the appliance to help it sit flush with your countertops, at least gives it a high-end feel.

Inside, you'll find a total of 21.9 cubic feet of storage space, 14.5 of which are allocated to the fridge and 7.4 of which are allocated to the freezer. Those numbers are all right on par with what you should expect from a counter-depth side-by-side fridge, but I wish that LG had done a little more to keep things from feeling cramped. Shelves that slide in or fold up and out of the way to make room for tall-sized items would have gone a long way, but you won't find them in this refrigerator, nor will you find any other features aimed at mitigating the narrow, shallow build.

	LG LSXC22436S	Samsung RS22HDHPNSR	GE GZS22DSJSS	Whirlpool WRS970CIDM
Fridge capacity	14.5 cubic feet	14.4 cubic feet	14.2 cubic feet	12.9 cubic feet
Freezer capacity	7.4 cubic feet	7.9 cubic feet	7.7 cubic feet	7.0 cubic feet
Total capacity	21.9 cubic feet	22.3 cubic feet	21.9 cubic feet	19.9 cubic feet
Height	70 5/16 inches	70 1/8 inches	69 1/4 inches	69 inches
Width	35 7/8 inches	35 15/16 inches	35 3/4 inches	36 inches
Depth	29 3/8 inches	30 inches	29 1/2 inches	29 3/4 inches
Yearly energy consumption	520 kWh	646 kWh	669 kWh	648 kWh
Yearly energy cost ($0.12 per kWh)	$62	$78	$80	$78
Yearly energy cost per cubic foot	$2.83	$3.50	$3.65	$3.92
Energy Star-qualified	Yes	Yes	No	No
Warranty	1-year overall parts and labor	1-year overall parts and labor, 5-year sealed system parts and labor, 10-year parts and 5-year labor for compressor	1-year overall parts and labor	1-year overall parts and labor, 5-years sealed system parts and labor
Suggested retail price	$2,099	$2,110	$2,399	$2,499
Lowest retail price as of 5/14/18	N/A	$1,899	$2,159	$2,159

In layman's terms, this means that you won't be able to store tall items like wine bottles and milk jugs in the body of the fridge unless you lay them sideways or start yanking shelves out to make room. Fortunately, you'll find plenty of room for tall items in the door (along with an enormous butter bin, for good measure).

Aside from that, there's not a whole lot to say about this refrigerator's design, but I do want to mention the built-in Wi-Fi radio. LG is packing those Wi-Fi smarts into more and more of its appliances as part of an effort to link all of them to its SmartThinQ app and to voice assistants like Alexa and Google Assistant. The use cases are still pretty limited -- checking the filter status from your phone, sending diagnostic data to LG ahead of a maintenance visit or tweaking a temperature setting with your voice, for instance -- but I appreciate the fact that the fridge will send your phone an alert if someone ever leaves the door open.

10-out-of-10 performance

That, directly above, is one hell of a heat map. Specifically, it shows the average temperatures in each section of the LSXC22436S from a 72-hour test at the default 37-degree setting. As you can see, they're about as spot-on as it gets, including a couple of bull's-eyes in the main body shelves and absolutely no hot spots up above 40 degrees F, a benchmark for food safety used by the Food and Drug Administration.