What Are The Top Rated Air Fryers

Best Quiet: Taotronics Air Fryer Tt

• Doesnt have a full touchscreen

• Presets need some adjustment

Love air-fried food, but not the noisy fans that accompany many air fryers? This model is well-rated for being ultra quiet. In fact, our product tester said she could barely hear it when it was turned on.

Like most air fryers, the cook can manually select the cooking time and temperature or use one of 11 cooking presets to prepare fries, steak, bacon, fish, shrimp, vegetables, chicken, potatoes, bread, cake, or thawing frozen snacks. The cooking basket holds 6-quarts, is nonstick, and is dishwasher safe.

The square-shaped design of this model gives you more room to fit food in the cooking basket compared to smaller fryers with rounded baskets. Our product tester noted the basket shape helps spread food out a bit more versus piling it on top of each other, which can lead to less crisp cooking results.

The Spruce / Lindsay Boyers

Capacity: 6 quarts | Power Rating: 1750 watts | Dimensions: 11.73 x 13.39 x 11.73inches | Warranty: 1 year

“When I first started testing it, I actually turned it off and on a few times, because it was so quiet, I didnt think it was working.” – Lindsay Boyers, Product Tester

Best Air Fryers Of 2021 According To Testing

These top-notch air fryers make crispy fries and wings with little oil.

We updated this story in November 2021 to include more information on air fryers and what to look for when buying. We also added more detail about how we test air fryers in the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliance Lab and made sure that all of our picks were in stock.

Air fryers can be compared to small ovens that crisp up wings, fries, veggies and air-fried recipes with little oil. They come in several different styles, including basket-style, which is great for large batches of foods like fries and vegetables that benefit from shaking oven-style, which is ideal for cooking food on numerous shelves and often feature rotisserie accessories and toaster oven styles, which can toast, bake, broil and more in addition to air fry.

Air fryers create a nice “fried” finish that your oven range can’t compete with, and they also reheat food with results that blow away the average microwave. Plus, air fryers require only a small amount of oil to make foods crispy, which means a fraction of the calories and fat of traditional cooking methods, like deep frying.

How do air fryers work?

Are air fryers “healthy?”

How we test air fryers

• Performed the best in our lab tests â it made food the crispiest in the shortest amount of time
• Easy to use

• Some may think basket diameter is small

Best Value Air Fryer

• Cooks evenly for crispy results
• Affordable

Pros And Cons Of Air Fryers

There is no doubt that air fryers serve a multitude of purposes in the kitchen, from creating an oil-less version of fried foods to steaming vegetables to baking cupcakes and brownies. But an air fryer does have its limitations and drawbacks.

Heres a look at the pros of cooking with an air fryer:

• Pro: An air fryer produces crisp, moist food without the need for a deep fryer or large amounts of oil. If avoiding saturated fats and heavily fried foods is on your list of dietary priorities, then using an air fryer instead of a deep oil fryer is clearly the way to go.
• Pro: Air fryers are much easier to clean and maintain than traditional deep fryers. There is no large container of hot cooking oil to filter and store. The air fryer’s cooking basket can be washed by hand or in a dishwasher between uses.

Heres a look at the cons of cooking with an air fryer:

• Con: The constant flow of dry, superheated air around many foods can eventually strip them of moisture, especially on the surface. While some people may accept a bit of dryness as the price paid for healthier eating, others could be disappointed by the dryness and/or lack of flavor in air fried foods.
• Con: Cooking times can be considerably longer in an air fryer than a traditional deep fryer.

Also Check: Jimmy Dean Omelets Costco

What Exactly Is An Air Fryer

If you’re sorta, kinda not sure what an air fryer even is or why they’ve become so popular, let’s start there. The trendy air fryer is a fairly simple cooking machine that employs extremely hot, fast circulating air to flash-roast food inside of a contained frying basket. While there’s generally no or very little oil used, the results can be similar to that of traditional frying in that food comes out crispy on the outside and moist on the inside.

Air fryers heat up fast, cook quickly and make healthier versions of traditionally fatty fried foods, so what’s not to love? But it’s not just healthy versions of bar snacks. I use my air fryer for cooking skin-on chicken thighs to crispy perfection, veggies including mushrooms, pork chops, peppers, onions, and even seafood — namely shrimp, scallops and filets of fish. And because most air fryer baskets are nonstick, cleanup is often as simple as a quick spritz and wipe with a soapy sponge. Many are dishwasher safe too.

Starting to see the appeal?

We retested some of our favorites and put a few new models through their paces.

An Attractive Stainless Steel Air Fryer With A 6

Williams Sonoma

• Features: Easy-to-read LED display, 6 built-in smart programs
• Additional Functions: Roast, broil, bake, reheat, dehydrate

The Instant Pot Vortex Plus Air Fryer is large enough to cook meals for a family, but not so big that it will commandeer your whole counter. This air fryer has a 6-quart capacity, and its sleek, smudge-resistant stainless steel design will make an attractive addition to your kitchen, especially if your other appliances have the same finish.

The Instant Pot Vortex Plus has six built-in programsair fry, roast, broil, bake, reheat and dehydratethat you can select via its easy-to-read LED screen. Buyers say that the size is perfect and the unit is ideal for cooking chicken, fries, veggies and other essentials, and because the inner container is square, youre able to fit more food per batch.

Don’t Miss: Jimmy Dean Sausage In Air Fryer

A Inexpensive Air Fryer With Numerous Preset Cooking Options

Amazon

• Features: Digital display, 8 presets, recipe book
• Additional Functions: N/A

Certain high-end air fryers can be quite pricey, but if youre OK with a basic model that solely air fries, this appliance from GoWISE is a solid choice that costs a whole lot less. The sleek gadget comes in four different colors, and it has a sizable 3.7-quart capacity. It has a digital screen that lets you set the temperature between 170 and 400 degrees Fahrenheit, and you can set its timer anywhere from one to 30 minutes.

Thats not all, either. The budget air fryer has eight preset cooking programs, including options for warming, fries/chips, chicken, steak, shrimp, pork, cake and fish. Plus, the appliance comes with a recipe book with 50 different meals to make in your new air fryer.

What Are The Advantages Of Air Fryers

An air fryer is one of the quickest-cooking appliances out there aside from a microwave, making it a real time-saver, especially for weeknight meals. Plus, it’s more versatile and produces crisper results than a microwave.

Air fryers cook pretty much anything you’d normally roast in an oven: vegetables, fish, whole chickens, and more. Think beyond chicken nuggets and the possibilities are endless.

Also Check: Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Royal Champagne

How Our Test Kitchen Found The Best Air Fryers

To find our Test Kitchen-Preferred air fryer, our team tested the most popular air fryers on the market, whipping up all sorts of recipes and judging them according to these standards:

• Texture: How well do our favorite air fryer recipes turn out? Is the finished product crisp? Tender?
• Cooking quality: Does the air fryer cook food thoroughly? Our Test Kitchen cooked all kinds of dishes, including meatballs, crab cakes, chicken wings and even cinnamon rolls.
• Price: Is the product affordable? Was the performance reflected in the price?

What We Think Of The Chefman Turbofry Air Fryer

Air fryers, especially large capacity ones, are almost always bulky and have to be stored on your counter. If you have a decorated kitchen, you probably want an air fryer that enhances the kitchen, not distracts from it.

The Chefman TurboFry Air Fryer is our sleek pick because it has a modern, minimalistic, and attractive design. It is made from stainless steel, but it has some dark gray and black accents as well. It has a traditional square shape, which means it can fit into most places in the kitchen.

In addition to having a sleek appearance, this air fryer is effective too. It has four preset functions that includes chicken, fries, meat, and fish. These buttons make cooking some of your favorite meals easy.

The model comes with a digital display, which shows you cook times and reminders. Once again, the display enhances the usability of the model, but it makes it look very modern and sleek at the same time.

You can even cook for multiple family members when using this air fryer. Because of its 8 court capacity, it is perfect for large family cooking or gatherings.

Very simple but great. Doesnt heat up the kitchen, dehydrates fast, and air fries perfectly and quickly. You can reheat french fries so they taste restaurant crispy again. Love it!

cheryl

All around, the Chefman TurboFry Air Fryer is a great air fryer because it is sleek and functional, though it may be a tad overpriced for what it offers.

Also Check: Jimmy Dean’s Breakfast Bowls

Best With Pressure Cooker: Instant Pot Pro Crisp + Air Fryer

• Inner pot is stovetop- and oven-safe

• Convenient vent/pressure toggle

Fans of multi-functional kitchen appliances will want to check out this air fryer option from Instant Pot. It comes with two lidsone for air frying and one for pressure cookingthat enable the pot to function both an air fryer and the classic multi-cooker the brand is known for.

The pot holds up to 8-quarts, which is enough room to air-fry a whole chicken, and is equipped with 11 cooking functions which are sorted by which lid they should be paired with. The pressure cooking lid functions are: pressure cook, saute, slow cook, steam, and sous vide, and the air fryer lid functions are warm, air fry, roast, bake, broil, and dehydrate.

Our tester noted the inner pot has some upgraded features compared to other Instant Pot models, including side handles and a flat bottom for even cooking. It can also be used on stovetops and is oven-safe.

It comes with a number of accessories, including a multi-use cooking rack, nonstick air fryer basket, dehydrate/broil tray, a protective pad for the lids, and a storage cover. The accessories fit inside the cooker for compact storage.

The Spruce Eats / Donna Currie

Capacity: 8 quarts | Power Rating: 1500 watts | Dimensions: 14.75 x 12.5 x 15.5 inches with air fryer lid | Warranty: 1 year

Why Trust The Spruce Eats

Donna Currie is a cookbook author who reviews products and writes roundups for The Spruce Eats. Currently, she has no less than five air fryers in her house. She’s partial to air fryers that have multiple functions and her go-to right now is the Ninja Foodi because she likes the pressure cooker option.

This roundup was updated by Sharon Lehman, a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist who happily makes space for any gadget that make cooking faster and easier. She has tested and reviewed several air fryers for The Spruce Eats, including the Chefman TurboFry Air Fryer and Emeril Lagasse Power Air Fryer 360 on this list.

Also Check: Folding Air Fryer

What Are The Advantages And Disadvantages Of Air Fryers

Advantages:

• Theyre safer than traditional deep fryers Deep fryers often have a large amount of oil heated to high temperatures that is prone to splatter. On the other hand, air fryers are self-contained and use very little oil in comparison, so youll never have to worry about oil splatters.
• They use less oil than deep fryers Deep frying requires a lot of oil, which adds up considerably in cost over time. Air fryers usually use less than two tablespoons of oil. Less oil also means fewer calories in your air fried foods.
• Air frying can reduce the risk of acrylamide formation in food According to Medical News Today, frying food in oil can cause acrylamide to form. Acrylamide is a toxic compound thats been linked to the development of some cancers, such as oesophageal and pancreatic cancer.
• Air fryers take up less space than traditional deep fryers Most home kitchens are pretty limited in space many air fryers are designed to take up only a small amount of space and can fit right on your countertop.

Disadvantages:

Best Air Fryer Toaster Oven: Cuisinart Toa

If you prefer the versatility and extra space that comes from having an oven-style air fryer, theCuisinart TOA-60 is a great option. We loved the square shape and compact size of this oven . The large knobs were straightforward and easy to use, and although this is subjective, we appreciated the lack of LCD screen. There was something about the tactile feel of using separate knobs to select the cooking mode, temperature and timer that made us feel in total control over the cooking process.

One of the primary reasons we chose this model over other oven-style fryers is that its fryer basket is just a little bit deeper than the other ones we tested. Its not by much, but just enough to make it noticeably easier to shake up fries or other loose items you may be air frying. We found shallower baskets are more likely to either send a few fries flying off, or just not allow you to shake them up effectively. The interior light was a nice perk as well, and made it easy to keep an eye on the food inside without opening it up and losing heat.

Performance-wise, the Cuisinart TOA-60 cooked food to near perfection and even resulted in our favorite fries of the bunch.

One of the most valuable features of the Cuisinart is its three-year warranty, the longest of any oven-style version we tested. That Cuisinart stands behind this product should address any concerns with the relatively high cost of this model.

Also Check: Sam’s Club Nuwave Air Fryer

Best For Dual Cooking: Ninja Foodi Dz201 6

What We Love: Can cook different foods at different settings at the same time, easy-to-clean

What We Don’t Love: Requires a lot of space to store

Some air-fried foods go perfectly together, such as French fries and chicken tenders. But with most air fryers, you have to cook these separately, leading whichever you cook first to get cold while the other cooks.

One solution for quick and easy dinners is taking advantage of the Ninja Foodi Air Fryer with DualZone Technology. Its essentially two air fryers in one, so you can prepare a main dish and side dish at the same time. The two sides can operate at different settings and temperatures. The Smart Finish feature syncs cook times in both baskets so everything finishes cooking at the same time.

This model holds up to 8 quarts of food at a time, split between two 4-quart baskets. Both the baskets and crisper plates have a ceramic nonstick coating that is dishwasher safe and easy to clean. From cooking to clean up, this air fryer cuts back on time spent in the kitchen.

Dimensions : 15.6 x 13.8 x 12.4 | Weight: 17.8 pounds | Capacity: 8 quarts | Wattage: 1690 W

Prestige Electric Air Fryer Paf 60

The Prestige electric PAF 6.0 is a compact, easy-to-use, and non-sticky air fryer at a very reasonable price. You can use this air fryer to cook, fry, roast, grill, and bake your favourite food items. Also, it comes with a smoke vent that absorbs unwanted smoke and smell while cooking food. This air fryer keeps your cholesterol in check as the excess oil gets deposited at the bottom. Furthermore, the heat distribution is even ensuring that the food is cooked evenly and this air fryer comes with a non-stick tray which is quite easy to use and clean. Lastly, with a capacity of 2L, this product is an ideal choice for small families on a budget.

• Price: 4,240

Also Check: Emeril’s Air Fryer Cookbook

Solara Digital Air Fryer

The Solara digital air fryer is a modern-designed, user-friendly, and affordable product for Indian kitchens. If you love having healthy fried food, then this is this air fryer is for you as the food prepared in it contains 85% less fat than other fried foods. Also, less amount of oil is used and the food is cooked faster with 360° air circulation. Moreover, one of the most attractive features of this air fryer is that it comes with an advanced touch screen menu with 6 cooking presets and you also get a free recipe eBook that contains more than 100 recipes so that you try out different dishes.

Furthermore, the pan of the fryer is non-stick and it comes with a detachable basket. As this basket is dishwasher safe so it is quite easy to clean.

• Price: 5,499

Tefal Actifry Genius Xl 2

Best air fryer for versatility

Pros: Versatile multi-dish cooking

Cons: Takes a lot of space up on the countertop

Star rating: 4.5/5

The distinctive dome of the Tefal ActiFry has evolved into this multi-level cooker, which can be programmed to remind you when to add different menu components.

Other fryers have baskets that allow the fat to drain away not this one. Any oil will collect on the doughnut-shaped tray at the bottom, with a central paddle that turns, to ensure food is slowly coated in the oil.

You can get amazingly good results with very little oil, so its still far healthier than deep frying or even baking on a sheet in the oven, where more fat is needed to cover the surface.

Another container for the likes of meat or fragile fish fillets can then be added over the central stalk, to double up cooking space. And you can see it all through a giant window so dont have to lose heat by opening the lid to check on progress.

Although it took a bit of exploration with the manual, the pre-sets and settings are easy to use when you get the hang of the touch controls. Read our full Tefal Genius ActiFry 2-in-1 air fryer review.

Available from:

Best air fryer for making chips

Pros:

• No automatic pause when checking cooking
• Recipe card cooking times can take too long

Star rating: 4/5

This model can also dehydrate herbs and fruit, and even make beef jerky if you’re feeling adventurous.

Available from:

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