Yes. Apples freeze for about 8-12 months, but the texture turns soft, so frozen apples work best cooked or blended rather than eaten fresh.
A big bag of apples that's about to turn is a classic reason people look this up, especially after apple picking season. Freezing is a solid way to save them from going to waste.
What trips people up is expecting frozen apples to taste like fresh ones. The texture shift is real, so it helps to know what they're actually good for afterward.
Peel, core, and slice or chop the apples, then toss them with a little lemon juice, about a tablespoon per two apples, to slow browning. Spread the pieces on a tray in a single layer and freeze until solid, about 2 hours, before transferring to a freezer bag; this keeps the pieces from clumping into one frozen mass and lets you scoop out just a handful later.
Apples hold good quality in the freezer for about 8-12 months. They're safe to eat well beyond that at 0°F, but flavor and texture fade over time, and pieces left in for over a year tend to taste noticeably flatter even if they're still perfectly safe.
Because apples are high in water, freezing breaks down their cell walls and leaves them noticeably softer and mushier once thawed, closer to cooked apples than fresh ones. That texture makes them a poor fit for fresh snacking or a crisp salad topping, though the flavor itself stays fairly close to fresh.
Skipping the lemon juice step lets cut apples brown before they even freeze. Freezing whole apples instead of slices also leads to uneven texture and makes them harder to portion later, since a whole frozen apple can take hours to thaw through. And thawing a full bag at room temperature turns the bottom layer to mush before the rest even softens.
Firmer, tart varieties like Granny Smith or Honeycrisp tend to hold their shape a little better in pies and crisps than very soft varieties like Red Delicious, which can turn almost to sauce after freezing and baking. If you're not sure what you have on hand, treating any variety as sauce-and-baking material after freezing is a safe bet. A quick precook, simmering slices for a couple of minutes before freezing, can also help pie filling hold its shape a bit better later.
Frozen apples are a great head start for baking, sauces, and smoothies, even though they lose the crisp bite of a fresh apple. Slice, toss with lemon juice, and flash-freeze on a tray for the best results.
Not necessarily, peeling is optional and mostly about texture preference in the final dish. Leaving the peel on works fine for smoothies or sauces that get blended anyway.
You can, but they take up more space, thaw unevenly, and turn very mushy since the core and skin trap moisture. Slicing first gives a much better result.
They can, especially without a lemon juice or ascorbic acid treatment before freezing, since exposed apple flesh oxidizes quickly even in the freezer.
Yes, many pie and crisp recipes work fine with frozen apples added directly, though you may need a few extra minutes of baking time and a bit more thickener to absorb the extra moisture they release.