Refrigerator Compressor Not Running: Read the Clicking First

A refrigerator that clicks every few minutes and stays warm has usually not lost its compressor. It has usually lost the small part that starts it. The click is the overload protector cutting power after a failed start attempt, waiting, and letting it try again.

That distinction is worth roughly the difference between a modest part and a new refrigerator, and it is decided by listening rather than testing.

There is also a clock on it, which almost nothing written about this symptom mentions. Every failed start pushes current through the motor windings and heats them. A refrigerator left clicking for a week can convert a cheap repair into an expensive one. If yours is clicking, this is a today problem.

First: is the compressor actually not running?

“Not running” and “not cooling” get used interchangeably and they are different faults with different answers.

Pull the refrigerator out and find the compressor — a black cylinder, low at the back. Touch it.

Cold and silent. It is not running. This article applies.

Warm and humming, but the fridge is not cold. It is running. The problem is elsewhere — airflow, the sealed system, or the controls. Start with a warm fridge and a cold freezer if that describes your symptoms, because a cold freezer is direct proof the compressor is doing its job.

Hot to the touch. Note that, and read the condenser section below before anything else.

Then: listen to the interval

Stand next to it for ten minutes and time the clicks.

A click every two to five minutes, each followed by silence. This is the classic pattern. The control calls for cooling, the compressor attempts to start, it cannot, it draws heavy locked-rotor current, and the overload protector opens to save the motor. Two to five minutes later the overload cools, resets, and the cycle repeats.

Here is the part that trips people up: the clicking overload is the component that is working. It is a safety device performing exactly as designed. Its noise is a symptom of a fault upstream, not evidence of its own failure.

On most refrigerators the start relay and overload protector are combined into one assembly that plugs onto the side of the compressor. The relay’s job, as iFixit describes it, is to provide power to the start winding alongside the run winding “for a split second at startup.” When it stops doing that, the compressor cannot get moving, and everything above follows.

Before you order any part: heat and power

Two causes need nothing but an hour and a vacuum, and both produce a compressor that will not run.

Dirty condenser coils. The coils shed the heat the compressor generates. Packed with dust and pet hair, they stop shedding it, the compressor overheats, and its own thermal protection shuts it down — clicking included. Unplug the refrigerator, pull it out, vacuum the coils and brush them clean. This is the most satisfying possible outcome: no parts, no cost.

A failed condenser fan. That fan is what pushes air across the coils. If the blade is jammed or the motor has failed, clean coils do not help — the compressor still has no cooling air. Turn the blade by hand with the power off; it should spin freely.

Low or unstable supply voltage. A refrigerator on a long extension cord, a tired outlet, or a circuit sagging under other load can fail to start its compressor while everything else appears normal. Plug it into a known-good outlet directly. This costs nothing to rule out and is easy to overlook.

Then the start relay

With heat and power ruled out, the relay is the next and most likely candidate.

Unplug the refrigerator. Remove the rear access panel and unclip the relay assembly from the side of the compressor. Then use two senses:

Look. Scorch marks, discolouration, or melted plastic on the relay body or its terminals.

Smell. A burnt electrical odour is close to conclusive. iFixit’s own guidance is to replace it if a burnt smell is present.

Some relays rattle when shaken, which is often described as a failure sign. Treat it as suggestive rather than decisive — the visual and smell checks are more reliable.

Order the replacement by your model number through a parts retailer’s fitment tool. Do not order from the code stamped on the old relay alone; the same physical part shape covers several electrically different variants.

Where this stops being a home repair

Two hard boundaries, and they are not formalities.

Capacitors hold their charge after the refrigerator is unplugged. Some models have a run or start capacitor in the compressor circuit. A charged capacitor can deliver a serious shock through a hand long after the appliance is disconnected. If your model has one and you are not confident about discharging it safely, this is where to stop.

The sealed refrigerant system is not a homeowner repair. Opening it requires EPA certification, it is federally regulated, and a punctured line generally means the refrigerator is finished. Nothing in this diagnosis requires opening it. If a repair path leads there, it leads to a technician.

Why we are not giving you an ohm range

You will find pages offering compressor winding resistance values to test with — so many ohms pin to pin, infinity pin to ground.

iFixit, which publishes the most complete public troubleshooting tree for this fault, states the problem with that directly: compressor resistance values “vary based on the compressor,” and no single diagnostic definitively separates a failed compressor from a failed start component without model baseline data.

So a number from someone else’s refrigerator can send you two ways, both bad: condemning a healthy compressor and scrapping a repairable appliance, or probing a live circuit to get a reading. Neither is worth it when elimination of the cheap components answers the question anyway.

The realistic outcomes

Coils were filthy or the condenser fan had stopped. No parts. Clean, restore airflow, done.

The start relay had failed. An inexpensive part and a straightforward swap, provided you caught it before the repeated starts cooked the windings.

The relay is new and it still will not start. Now the compressor itself is the likely answer — and this is usually where the repair stops being worth doing. A compressor replacement on a domestic refrigerator often approaches the cost of a replacement appliance, which makes it a decision rather than a repair.

If you have reached that point, the sealed system is the one failure category where replacing generally wins, and the energy saving people expect to offset it is smaller than advertised — EPA publishes two figures for it that differ by about five times. See refrigerator repair or replace.

Which brings the point back round: the interval between those clicks is telling you which of these three you are in, and how much time you have before the answer changes.