LG's InstaView Refrigerator Uses UV Light to Sanitize Your Water

Ever worry about bacteria in the drinking water from your refrigerator's built-in dispenser? LG wants to put your mind at ease with its new InstaView refrigerator, introduced at this year's virtual CES, which uses ultraviolet LED light to "virtually eliminate" bacteria on the nozzle. 

LG says its UVnano technology operates once every hour to remove "up to 99.9 percent of bacteria" such as E. coli, staph, and pseudomonas aeruginosa (which can cause pneumonia) on the refrigerator's dispenser tap. You can also activate UVnano whenever you want with the press of a button. 

The company first introduced water dispenser and purification products with bacteria-bashing UV light in 2017, but the InstaView Door-in-Door Side-by-Side Refrigerator With UVnano is the first US model with the technology. Last year, LG released a pair of true wireless earphones, the Tone Free HBS-FN6, that come with a UVnano charging case that kills germs inside. 

Dyson uses similar technology in its Pure Humidify+Cool fan. A column in the machine's water tank uses UV-C light to kill waterborne bacteria by denaturing its DNA so it can no longer multiply. Dyson says this system kills 99.9 percent of waterborne bacteria on the first pass. 

We're also seeing UV light being put to frequent use in phone sanitizers.

LG's new UVnano-equipped refrigerator also sports a 23% larger InstaView glass panel than previous models, which you can tap twice to illuminate and see what's inside without letting cold air out. The Door-in-Door feature lets you quickly grab frequently accessed items without opening the whole fridge, another energy-saving feature. 

Meanwhile, a different model in LG's 2021 refrigerator lineup, dubbed the InstaView ThinQ With Voice Recognition, offers another particularly handy feature: the ability to open itself when you have your hands full. When you're coming in with bags of groceries, you can simply say, "open the refrigerator door." 

LG hasn't yet announced pricing or availability details for its new InstaView refrigerators. A spokesperson said to expect more news on that "in the coming months."