We Tested Air Fryers (Making Enough Wings and Fries to Last a Lifetime) to Find the Best Ones

We love air fryers at Serious Eats. They’re staples in our test and home kitchens. I’ve been an air fryer fan for years, using mine to make easy breaded chicken cutlets, crisp up Brussels sprouts or potatoes, and heat various frozen foods.

All this to say, we think an air fryer is absolutely worth it. It cooks efficiently, works faster than an oven (or toaster oven), and actually minimizes cleanup. Don’t just take it from me, though.

The Best Air Fryer

Instant Vortex Plus 6-Quart 6-in-1 Air Fryer

I’ve been using this air fryer since 2021. It cooks faster and more evenly than any other. (Fries were crispy in 14 minutes, and the chicken wings got nicely golden in under 25 minutes.) The Instant has a large, six-quart capacity and a wide, square basket that allows for maximum air circulation. Its intuitive, bright digital control panel features a knob that makes adjusting the time and temperature easy. Unlike many air fryers, it allows you to manually set the temperature in five-degree increments, giving you more control, and it also saves your last used temperature and heat settings.

Another Great Air Fryer

Ninja 4-Quart Air Fryer

The Ninja is smaller and cheaper than the Instant but still performs well. Its timer counts down at the one-minute mark, and its analog control panel will appeal to those averse to touchscreens. 

The Best Air Fryer With a See-Through Window

Instant Pot Vortex Plus 6-Quart ClearCook Air Fryer

If watching food as it cooks sounds like your idea of a good time, behold this Instant air fryer. It shares many of the same qualities as its other winning sibling, including a digital control panel, control knob, and crisping abilities. Its beeps remind us of a video game.

The Best Air Fryer Toaster Oven

Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro

When we tested air fryer toaster ovens, this Breville was a clear winner. While it toasted fine, it crisped and browned food exceptionally well. Its large size can even accommodate a whole roast chicken and its digital screen and clearly labeled knobs were easy to use.

How We Tested the Air Fryers

• Set Up Test: Before cooking in them, we washed each air fryer basket and wiped down the interior and exterior. Most manufacturers tell you to perform a test cycle or two to make sure your air fryer is working properly and burn off any residue left over from the manufacturing process. To keep this standardized, we heated all of the air fryers at 400℉ for five minutes, then let them cool.
• Frozen Fries Test: We cooked one pound of frozen French fries for 20 minutes at 400℉, shaking the basket every five minutes and noting whether the air fryer finished cooking early (when the fries were crispy and golden brown all over). For the air fryers with dual baskets, we first cooked a half-pound of fries in each basket, then repeated this test with one pound.
• Homemade French Fries Test: We made homemade French fries with each air fryer, using 1.5 pounds of potatoes.
• Chicken Wings Test (Winners Only): We used our favorite air fryers to cook two pounds of chicken wings.
• Usability Tests: Throughout testing, we evaluated how easy it was to set the time and temperature and shake the air fryer baskets midway through cooking. We also noted how quiet (or loud) the air fryers were when on. 
• Cleanup Tests: After each test, we washed the air fryer baskets by hand. At the end of testing, we used the dishwasher to clean the top picks with dishwasher-safe baskets.

What We Learned

First, What’s an Air Fryer?

An air fryer is essentially a convection oven equipped with a very effective fan. Compared to an oven, an air fryer is small and has a compact cooking chamber. This means it heats up quickly and efficiently. Because of this, many air fryers also skip preheating, with their timers immediately counting down as soon as you press start. Air fryers also feature cooking baskets with all-over perforations, which allow air to efficiently circulate around food for even browning. 

Worth mentioning, too, is exactly how contained an air fryer is. Unlike the stovetop, or even an oven door that gets splattered with grease, any messes stay within the air fryer, cutting down on cleanup. (Occasionally, though, you should deep-clean your air fryer.)

What Are the Types of Air Fryers?

There are three types of air fryers. Here’s how they compare to each other: 

• Basket air fryers: If you think of an air fryer, this is likely it. This style of air fryer has one core task: air frying. It has a basket with a handle that can be easily grasped for shaking food mid-cooking.
• Air fryer toaster ovens:Air fryer toaster ovens are, basically, toaster ovens with air fryer functions. They come with perforated or wire mesh inserts for better air circulation. Like a toaster oven, they can also toast, bake, broil, and roast.
• Dual basket air fryers: These models have two baskets that are smaller than a standard air fryer’s. They can be run at the same temperature and time or at different ones.

Why You Don’t Need to Preheat an Air Fryer

Preheating an air fryer doesn’t necessarily determine whether it’ll crisp food better or faster. However, some air fryers (like those from Instant) have built-in preheating cycles that last for about three to four minutes. Only one of these models (the winner, the Instant Vortex Plus 6 Quart Air Fryer) had a preheat cycle that cut down on the cooking time. For example, when we made frozen fries, they were done after 10 minutes at 400℉, whereas other models took 20 minutes. Even with a built-in preheat time of four minutes, that’s six minutes faster. Other models with built-in pre-heating cycles didn’t crisp as well, but that came down to other factors, like basket shape and size, and not the preheating cycle. 

So, should you preheat an air fryer? Unless your model has a built-in cycle, you can skip it.

Which Air Fryers Made the Crispiest Food? 

Performance and speed varied between the air fryers. For best results, we recommend taking recipe times with a grain of salt and frequently checking (and shaking) your food. This will help you figure out whether your air fryer’s running hotter/faster or colder/slower. However, we found the cooking basket’s size and shape played a big role in performance.

The best air fryers had square baskets that were at least 10 inches wide and 4.25 inches high, lessening crowding and allowing for more air circulation. It’s worth noting that fan speed may have impacted performance, too, but this was hard to measure. Our favorite air fryer, from Instant, cooked fries in about 14 minutes and chicken wings in 25 minutes.

As for the poor performers, for the most part, air fryers with smaller, round baskets cooked and crisped worse than ones with larger, square baskets. The reason is simple: There was more crowding and less room for airflow. Air fryers with trays (we’re not talking about air fryer toaster ovens) did the worst of all. Take the Instant Vortex Plus 10 Quart Air Fryer. Because the fan was located in the ceiling, the top tray browned (and even burned) before the bottom tray cooked.

It’s also worth noting that most air fryers have a maximum temperature of 400℉. (Only one air fryer in our lineup went up to 450℉.) If you’re trying to make a non-air fryer recipe in the air fryer and the recipe calls for 425℉, setting the air fryer to 400℉ will likely suffice.

Why We Don’t Recommend Air Fryers with Dual Baskets

Air fryers with dual baskets—like the Instant Vortex Plus Dual ClearCook Airfryer and Ninja Foodi 2-Basket Air Fryer—allow you to set two separate temperatures and cook times or sync them to run in tandem. However, their performance just didn’t match their appeal. This is because you aren’t getting more cooking space, despite the machines being (quite actually) double the size of standalone models.

The Instant and Ninja’s baskets measured 6.15 and 6.65 inches wide compared to the Instant Vortex’s 10.14 inches. While these models could cook a half-pound of fries in each basket without issue, as soon as we bumped it up to one pound, the spuds emerged raw after 20 minutes. In contrast, our top pick could easily handle a pound of fries (and then some). If you want an air fryer that works well with any quantity of food, we don’t see the value in buying a dual-basket air fryer. However, if you cook for two and want to frequently, say, make a protein and vegetable at two different temperatures at once, opt for the Instant Dual Clear Cook.