The time it takes for air conditioning coils to completely unfreeze typically ranges from one to four hours, depending heavily on the thickness of the ice block and environmental conditions. If you simply turn the cooling system off and let it sit idle, the natural ambient temperature of the house will slowly melt the ice, a process that can take several hours depending on how heavily encased the coil is. You can significantly speed up this defrosting process by switching your thermostat fan setting from auto to on, which forces the indoor blower fan to continuously circulate room-temperature air across the frozen metal fins. Opening interior doors and removing a dirty air filter can also enhance airflow and reduce the melting time down to an hour or less. It is critical to ensure that all ice has completely melted and the system is fully dry before turning the cooling mode back on, as restarting a partially frozen coil will only cause the remaining ice to expand and refreeze instantly.
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