What Should You Look For In An Air Fryer
Power and size are the most important factors in finding the best air fryer for you. The Ninja air fryer that we liked best has 1,550 watts of power but you can expect an oven with slightly less oomph to also deliver solid results.
The best size for an air fryer is relative and will vary based on your personal requirements. A 4-quart model should be enough for most households and can easily hold five or six chicken thighs at once. There are also air fryers as large as 10 quarts that make cooking for large groups easier and some as small as 2 quarts that are perfect for singles and couples. Other considerations include how intuitive the interfaces, dials and controls are as well as the build and durability of each air fryer.
Are Air Fryers Healthy
While an air fryer can certainly be a healthier alternative to deep-frying foods, simply using an air fryer to make a recipe does not make it healthier. “A major misconception is that pre-fried items are somehow made healthier when prepared in an air fryer. Air frying is certainly a great way to prepare these frozen foods to crispy perfection, but these types of foods are no healthier than when prepared in a conventional oven,” says Food Network’s health and nutrition consultant Dana White, MS, RD, ATC.
Amanda Neal
What Were Looking For
Single- or multifunctional: Perhaps the most important matter to decide on is whether you want an air fryer that is just an air fryer or one that also does a lot of other things. Some on this list are one-trick ponies, while others have settings that allow you to broil, dehydrate, proof, and more.
Capacity: How you intend to use your air fryer should, of course, affect what size you buy. Are you planning to use it mostly for yourself to bake off the occasional single cookie or to reheat leftovers? Or is the idea to use it for regular family dinners? For this category, Ive listed the capacity of each model. But it should be noted: Basket-style air fryers are measured in terms of how many quarts they hold, while ones with rack inserts are measured in terms of their interior cubic inches.
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Do Air Fryers Use A Lot Of Electricity
In general, yes, air fryers do use quite a bit of electricity. To find out how much your specific air fryer uses, look near the label on the back. It may tell you a wattage. If not, use an electricity usage monitor to plug your air fryer into. Once you do, itll tell you a live-reading of the exact amount of energy it pulls from the wall outlet.
Once you know the wattage, you can easily calculate the actual power cost. Simply multiple the air fryers wattage by its operational hours. That said, an air fryer that uses 2000 watts, 1 hour per day will use 2 kWh. You can find out how much 1 kilowatt hour costs by looking at your electricity bill or calling your utility provider.
The average kWh price in the USA is around 11 cents. But this can vary drastically if you live in certain states. For example, the average price per kWh in Hawaii is around 27 cents while Idaho is around 8 cents. Ultimately, this means running your 2000 watt air fryer for an hour per day will cost you around $15 per month in Hawaii or $5 per month in Idaho. Needless to say, it can get expensive if you add it up over the course of time.
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Best Air Fryer For 2022
Your options for air fryers are many, with different features and functions. We tested all the top brands to separate the best air fryers from the rest of the pack.
David Watsky
Senior Editor / Home and Kitchen
David lives in Brooklyn where he’s logged more than a decade writing about all things edible, including meal kits and meal delivery subscriptions, cooking, kitchen gear and commerce. Since earning a BA in English from Northeastern in Boston, he’s toiled in nearly every aspect of the eats business from slicing and dicing as a sous-chef in Rhode Island to leading complex marketing campaigns for major food brands in Manhattan. These days, he’s likely somewhere trying the latest this or tasting the latest that – and reporting back, of course. Anything with sesame is his all-time favorite food this week.
- Price alerts on for Breville Smart Oven Air
We’ve seen kitchen trends come and go — many, in fact. But years removed from the first models hitting the market and air fryers remain one of the most asked-about small appliances. The air fryer remains our favorite way to reheat leftover pizza, fried foods and chicken. We also did some math and it turns out that energy-efficient air fryers will save money on your electric bill.
At this point, most probably know what the general deal is with air frying , but choosing the best air fryer to buy is another matter. One complication that arises in choosing an air fryer is how many types there are.
How We Test Air Fryers
To date, we’ve tested well over a dozen air fryers to curate this list. Each air fryer is evaluated for its power, consistency, ease of use, design, features and overall performance. In total, we’ve logged over 75 hours of air frying.
There are hundreds of recipes that can be made with an air fryer but we stuck to the basics and focused on the most popular foods people associate with air fryers. Chicken wings are at the top of that list but French fries, frozen snacks and dense vegetables — in this case, Brussels sprouts — are tried and true air fryer food. Before we began, we consulted each model’s manual for relevant cooking directions. If the manual didn’t provide specific instructions, we applied uniform procedures to each air fryer depending on the type of food we were preparing.
The Cosori Lite made some mighty tasty wings in 30 minutes.
For chicken wings, we followed a basic air fryer recipe. First, we preheated the air fryer 400 Fahrenheit and cooked them for 25 minutes in the basket with the included tray and checked on them and turned them every 8 minutes. Most of the air fryers we tested had a solid showing in the wing test although some, including the powerful Ninja and Cosori Lite models, got the wings a bit crispier in that amount of time.
Dense Brussels sprouts are a popular air fryer food. Soft and watery veggies such as zucchini and mushrooms may turn to mush under this type of intense heat.
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How Do Air Fryers Work
Air fryers are essentially countertop convection ovens. Convection cooking allows you to cook food quickly and evenly in less time than a traditional oven or toaster oven. A heating element and powerful fan are set within the cooking chamber. Together, they circulate hot air around the food set in a basket. The basket allows air to flow all over the food, making it extra crispy kind of like how oil surrounds your food during deep frying.
What Kind Of Accessories Does An Air Fryer Come With
Some fancy models may come with extra accessories, but really all you need is an air fryer basket with wire or nonstick grates. They come standard with most air fryer models and help the superconvection to hit all sides of your food evenly. I prefer the nonstick variety as wire baskets can be particularly tricky to clean.
All the air fryers we tested came with a grated fryer basket or tray. The Philips Essential Digital model has it attached to the handle making it easier to remove for cleaning.
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What Is An Air Fryer And How Does It Work
Despite the name, an air fryer doesn’t fry at all. Rather, air fryers are more like a supercharged convection oven, circulating hot air with a fan and hitting food more rapidly than most ovens. That causes the outside of food to cook more quickly without drying out the inside and giving a crispy, fried-like outer shell to wings, fries and other foods. Most air fryers come standard with a grated rack or perforated basket so the air can travel through and hit the food on all sides.
Best Low Wattage Air Fryers: Small Energy
If youre a fan of air frying, youre not alone. Air fryers are the preferred method for those looking for crunchy, evenly cooked food without the mess and added calories of oil. Whether youre health conscious or simply watching your weight, an air fryer should be an essential part of your home kitchen.
While most mid to large sized air fryers use up to 2000 watts while cooking, there are certain situations where youll need an air fryer thats more efficient.
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Whether you live in an RV, off grid or simply aware of your energy use, you may be looking into a low wattage air fryer. An air fryer that uses less watts will typically be smaller, but the trade-off is better energy use with the same crispy, oil-free results that youve come to expect.
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What Can You Make In An Air Fryer
The options for foods you can cook in an air fryer are vast, but some air fryer favorites include chicken wings, chicken tenders, french fries and mozzarella sticks. You can also make fish in an air fryer, including salmon, for a moist inside and roasted outer crust. Bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs are great when made in an air fryer, as are certain vegetables like Brussels sprouts, mushrooms, onions, peppers and carrots. Frozen foods such as dumplings, potato skins, Hot Pockets and tater tots can be made in an air fryer for a quick and easy snack or side dish. Air fryers can also quickly reheat food, like last night’s pizza or leftover fried chicken.
Best Air Fryers Of 2022
Models from Cosori, Dash, Gourmia, Instant Vortex, and other brands jockey for top spots in Consumer Reports’ ratings
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Crispy fries without all the oil? Thats the golden promise of air fryers, and it might explain why, in the U.S., the market for these appliances continues to grow year over year. In fact, the air fryer market is predicted to be worth more than $2.2 billion by 2028, according to .
Despite their name, air fryers dont fry food at all. Theyre actually small convection ovens. A fan circulates hot air to quickly cook food in the basket from the outside in. At first glance, these countertop cookers seem limited to finger foods like fries, chicken wings, chicken nuggets, or pizza bites. But you can use an air fryer to cook almost anything youd throw into the toaster oven or on the stove an air fryer just adds a kick of crispiness to anything it cooks .
So are air fryers worth the counter space? In the Consumer Reports lab, our testers ran through more than 50 models to reach our latest air fryer ratings. They found that air fryers were quite capable of turning out nicely cooked food. Even when we held cooking times and temperatures constant, the results were very similar, with no discernible differences in taste, said Larry Ciufo, the engineer who oversees air fryer testing.
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Choosing The Best Low Wattage Air Fryers
When youre looking for the best low wattage air fryers, there are certain things youll want to examine:
- Wattage The amount of wattage an air fryer uses is a direct indication on how much energy it uses. In general, air fryers that use less than 1000 watts are somewhat uncommon. Any option that pulls around 1000 watts could be classified as low wattage.
- Capacity How much food can your air fryer hold? The overall capacity will be listed in either quarts or liters. This will give you a clear indication on how much food you can cook at the same time. Smaller capacities are the typically trade-off when it comes to air fryers that use less wattage.
- Max Temperature Most foods need to be cooked at a relatively high temperature for the crispiest results. Knowing the highest temperature setting can give you an indication on what its capable of cooking.
- Dimensions The amount of footprint an air fryer takes up in your kitchen is crucial for those living in small spaces. Knowing the precise length, width and height can save you from purchasing a unit thats too large for your space.
Which Best Low Wattage Air Fryer Should You Choose
If youre looking for a compact, low-wattage air fryer, there are several great options to choose from. Lets quickly re-cap to help determine which you should choose.
For those who want the most energy-saving, look for the lowest wattage. That said, the Maxi-Matic Elite Compact Air Fryer is a great choice that only pulls 700 watts. Although it only has a 0.95 liter capacity, its the most compact, energy-efficient option on the market. You get a lot of great features with it, too. Not only does it save space and energy, it provides excellent cooking results each and every time.
The DASH Tasti-Crisp is our second top recommendation. Using only 1,000 watts, it provides over double the capacity of the Maxi-Matic. However, its about $20 more and alternatively available in a digital version.
The Copper Chef and CHEFMAN TurboFry are incredibly similar. With the same wattage, capacity and nearly identical dimensions, the only real benefit of the TurboFry when compared to the Copper Chef is the included one year warranty.
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How Powerful Should An Air Fryer Be
Most air fryers are somewhere between 1,200 and 1,800 watts. Larger air fryers typically have more wattage and smaller models have less. Your midrange 4-quart air fryer should have about 1,500 watts. The small Magic Bullet and Gourmia air fryers have 1,300, but that’s plenty of power to cook food in the petite basket. Larger air fryers should have about 100 more watts per quart to make sure they hit those hot temps of 400 to 450 Fahrenheit.
Other Air Fryers We Tested
Crux Marshmello: This compact 3-quart air fryer did well in testing and the cooking basket was easy to clean. But I wasn’t a fan of the control panels, which sport cutesy LED images in place of words, and it wasn’t abundantly clear what each one was for.
The Crux air fryer performed well but the control panel was a little too cute for its own good.
Phillips Essential Compact Air Fryer: I didn’t have any major complaints with this 4-quart model, and it’s a good value at under $120. That said, it was less powerful when air frying chicken wings and other foods.
PowerXL Air Fryer: This is another small air fryer that did well in testing, but I prefer the controls and sleek design of the more budget-friendly Gourmia 2-quart.
Instant Vortex: One popular option is the Instant Vortex. It’s priced in line with the other air fryers in this group. The Vortex is made by the same company that created the groundbreaking Instant Pot electric pressure cooker. Despite that, though, I wasn’t blown away by its results. Chicken wings and fried chicken were acceptable, not incredible, and less juicy than what other fryers produced. My Brussels sprouts ended up overdone too. And frozen fries were done but cooked unevenly.
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What Size Air Fryer Should You Get
While there are several features to consider, the size of your air fryer is likely the most important decision you’ll make. If you’re typically cooking for one or two people, a 2- or 3-quart air fryer should be large enough. Consider adding another quart of capacity to your air fryer for every person that you’re regularly cooking for. A family of four or five, for instance, should be fine with a 5-quart model. If you plan on regularly cooking full meals for a family including meat and veggies or sides, you might consider a larger, dual-basket air fryer like the Ninja DualZone that we’ve recommended above.
Here’s the tiny 2-quart Gourmia air fryer next to the more standard 4.25-quart Phillips model.
All that said, the smaller the air fryer you can get away with the better. I’ve found that smaller air fryers such as the Magic Bullet 2- to 5-quart model and Instant Pot’s Duo Crisp net better results since food is going to get blasted faster and more often than inside a larger model. But smaller air fryers mean less overall capacity, so you may have to cook in batches.