YETI Ice Block Review

What’s in the box

A blue block with a hard plastic shell and the YETI name moulded into the side. One end has a black cap, and the other is cut at an angle with a hole through it. Inside is a non-toxic, food-safe gel. There’s nothing else to it, and nothing to set up.

Quick Specs

How it works

The idea is simple. Ordinary ice freezes at 0°C. The gel in YETI Ice freezes at -2°C, so a frozen block sits a little colder than the ice around it. Put one in a cooler with regular ice, and it helps that ice last longer. Use it on its own in a small cooler or a lunch bag, and it chills what’s next to it without melting into water.

That last part is the practical win. The cold stays inside a sealed shell, so there’s no puddle in the bottom of the cooler and nothing soggy at the end of the day.

Shape and build

The shell is thick, hard plastic, and YETI’s line on the back is “breaks never”. The block comes with a 5 year warranty, which says something about how long it’s meant to last.

The shape is deliberate too. YETI says the custom shape reduces freezing time, so the block is ready again sooner after a trip. One end is angled, with a hole through it, which gives you something to hook a finger into when the block is wedged in a full cooler.

Size and weight

The 1 lb block weighs 458 g on our scale and is slim: about as long as a one-litre water bottle is tall, and much thinner. That makes it a good fit for a small soft cooler or a lunch bag, where a big block would take up half the space.

A 1 lb block is small, and it thaws relatively quickly. Left out in the open at room temperature, it lasts about two hours before it’s completely melted. For a bigger cooler, or a whole day out of the fridge, you’d want more than one, or one of the larger sizes. The 2 lb and 4 lb blocks are made for that.

How we use it

I use these blocks to pack with my fish bait on trips. The bait has to stay frozen, but our 40 L Kings fridge runs at about 3°C, and I don’t want to turn the whole fridge down to freezing and end up with a frozen iceberg lettuce. So the bait goes in packed with frozen Ice Blocks. In the fridge at about 3°C the blocks last at least half a day, which keeps the bait frozen for longer while everything else stays at fridge temperature.

The blocks work in any cooler as well. We’ve reviewed two they would suit: the Coleman 30 Can Soft Cooler and the Coleman 15L hard cooler.

Conclusion: YETI Ice Block

The YETI Ice Block is a tough, reusable ice pack that freezes at -2°C and keeps its cold inside a sealed shell, so the cooler stays dry. It comes in three sizes, 1 lb, 2 lb and 4 lb, and has a 5 year warranty. The 1 lb weighs 458 g. In our fridge at about 3°C it lasts at least half a day, which keeps my fish bait frozen without freezing everything else. Out in the open, a 1 lb block is melted in about two hours, it needs a freezer to recharge, and it takes up room that food could use. If you take a cooler or a fridge out often, it’s a handy thing to have.