Technology

Should You Buy an Air Fryer? Here’s What We Think

Published

5 days ago

July 12, 2024

Close-up of a Ninja air fryer control panel

It’s no exaggeration to say that air fryers represent the biggest cooking revolution of the last decade. But is buying one the right choice for you? If you’re thinking of investing in one, we’ve got all the information you need to decide.

If you’d like to see some buying options, check out our round-up of the best air fryers we’ve reviewed.

Will an air fryer save you money?

Now that energy prices have rocketed, the answer is almost certainly, yes. In many cases, it will be a very significant saving. UK consumer watchdog Which? published the results of tests to calculate the cost of cooking various common dishes in a 3L air fryer versus an electric oven:

Roast chicken:

Air fryer – 16p
Electric oven – 32p

Chips:

Air fryer – 8p
Electric oven – 24p

Baking a cake:

Air fryer – 6p
Electric oven – 19p

In the study, the air fryer was significantly faster with as good, or better, results each time. Plenty of other studies show the same findings. Obviously, these figures will be different if you’re in the US, but the ratios will be very similar.

Still, there will be times when it’s cheaper to use your oven, for example when cooking large volumes of food, or batch cooking. There are other occasions, for example when baking one or two potatoes, where the cheapest option is to cook them in the microwave then finish them in the air fryer to crisp up the skin.

Before you can start making savings, however, you’ll need to factor in the cost of buying the air fryer in the first place. But the cost of electricity is now so high that even if you don’t have an air fryer, and have to buy one, you’ll still end up making back your investment and then starting to save money in a few months.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

When buying, remember that larger, more complicated air fryers – such as dual-drawer and multifunctional air fryers – will likely have a higher wattage and cost more to use. If you know the wattage of the appliance you want to buy, you can use an online electricity price calculator to find out what it will cost to run. All you’ll need to know is your electricity unit price and you’ll be able to easily work out its running cost.

For even more accurate running cost analysis, you can buy a smart plug that measures energy use and plug your air fryer into that before you use it. We’ve tested some of the best smart plugs around, if you need help choosing one.

What do air fryers do?

In some ways, the name is misleading. Air fryers don’t actually fry food at all. Instead, they’re small convection cookers, circulating hot air around food. This gives a crispy, crunchy coating without the need to deep fry.

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

It’s like cooking using the fan-assisted setting on your ordinary oven, but in a more compact form. Convection cooking browns food and gives it a distinctive taste. In other words, an air fryer will provide the taste and texture of fried or roasted food, without you having to immerse your dinner in oil.

Are air fryers a healthier way to cook?

It really depends on what you’re comparing them against.

If you’re going to use your air fryer to cook items like oven-ready, batter-coated or crumb-coated fish, chicken nuggets or oven chips, an air fryer won’t make the items any healthier than cooking them in the oven.

But, if you were planning to deep- or shallow-fry food, you’ll save yourself a big calorie hit.

Deep fryers can use up to 50 times more oil than an air fryer. And although your food will only absorb a relatively small proportion of that oil, deep frying is still the most calorie-dense way to cook.

Frying food also produces acrylamide, a compound linked to cancer development. Air-frying may help to lower the amount of acrylamide in the food you cook. However, it won’t affect the formation of other harmful compounds associated with cooking foods at very high temperatures.

You’ll still also need to use some oil if you’re cooking fresh food, although it’ll only be between a teaspoon and a tablespoon if you’re making food from scratch. Pre-prepared items such as oven chips and nuggets won’t need added oil.

How does air frying compare with oven cooking?

Although there’s no health advantage to cooking oven-ready items in an air fryer, you’ll probably find that you can roast fresh items in an air fryer using less oil than you’d use in an oven. If you parboil potatoes and spray them with oil, you can pop them in an air fryer and get very crisp roast potatoes in around 25 minutes.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

Another advantage is that air fryers get extremely hot very quickly, and the circulating air means that food will get perfectly browned all over. This means you’ll be able to cut your cooking time and up the crunchiness in the finished product. It also makes it easier to cook things like sweet potato fries, which can go limp in an oven.

An air fryer will be faster than oven cooking. Because of the quicker cooking time and the smaller size of an air fryer compared to your oven, it’s more energy efficient. This means that it’s a more environmentally-friendly cooking option and one that’ll save you money in the long run. It’s a good cooking appliance to use if you want to minimise electricity bills.

Air fryer cooking is more convenient as well, thanks to the fact that air fryers have inbuilt cooking alarms, so you’ll be alerted when your food is ready. Most also feature multiple easy-to-programme cooking modes (such as roast, air fry, dehydrate), making them simple to cook with, once you get a sense of cooking times and temperatures.

Like oven cooking, you’ll still need to keep an eye on your air frying food and probably turn it over once during the cooking process. Many air fryers feature a shake/turn alert to let you know when to do this.

How does air frying compare with deep frying?

Although it’s much faster than baking in an oven, air frying will take twice as long as deep frying. On the plus side, it’s much easier to clean up afterwards and the appliance will contain the smell of cooked food, so it won’t linger around your home the way pan- or deep-fried food does.

What can you cook in an air fryer?

The obvious items are chicken, chips, frozen burgers, plus other frozen food like nuggets and fish fingers.

Fresh fish, including salmon, can also be air fried. So can bacon. Most meat dishes can be prepared in an air fryer, although you’ll have to cut down your cooking time and change the temperature. You can roast potatoes and other vegetables.

You can also use it in more inventive ways, for example to make homemade crisps, toasted seeds and nuts.

If you get a compatible baking pan, you can make baked goods, including cookies, cakes and desserts. They will be done more quickly, using much less power than the oven.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

My personal air fryer favourites are toasted cheese sandwiches (use a toothpick to hold it together) and crispy gnocchi (cover it in boiling water first).

Finally, it’s very handy to heat up leftovers – especially leftover pizza slices, which aren’t very microwave-friendly.

What can’t you cook in an air fryer?

You only really need to avoid foods that’ll melt (cheese and homemade batter) or food that’ll get blown around (leafy dishes tend not to work very well). Still, if you adjust your recipe, you can cook items in a homemade breadcrumb mix, and anything with a cheese filling is fine.

There are better ways to cook broccoli and similar vegetables, which can dry out or wind up soggy.

Dry food coated in seasoning will end up losing its seasoning as it cooks.

And if you like a rare burger or steak, forget it. By the time the outside has browned, the inside of the meat will be well done.

That being said, there are recipes for all kinds of air-fried foods, including some of the above, so technique is important and you may just have to experiment to see what works for you.

How do you clean an air fryer?

Air fryers are easy to clean and should be cleaned properly after each use. The pan, tray and basket can be washed in warm water and washing-up liquid or (most) can go into the dishwasher. The appliance itself should be unplugged and wiped down after use and the heating element regularly cleaned with a soft brush.

Like other counter-top appliances, an air fryer should stand on a heatproof surface.

How large is an air fryer?

Air fryers come in different sizes, so you need to take into account both the external dimensions (do you have space for it?) and the internal space (is it large enough to contain the portion sizes you’ll most often prepare?).

One of the limitations of an air fryer is that if food is crowded inside, the cooking performance will be affected. It cooks by circulating hot air, so if the air can’t get to the food, it won’t cook properly. If you’re mulling over size options, if you have the space, we’d suggest opting for the larger model. Don’t forget that it’ll need several inches of free space around it while it’s in operation.

But bear in mind that larger air fryers will cost slightly more to run.

The smallest type of air fryer is a single drawer model. These tend to have a capacity of about 3-6 litres or quarts. These will be large enough to cook a portion of french fries for 1-3 people or 2-3 chicken breasts. On the higher end of this scale, they may provide enough space to cook a whole chicken.

The next size up are dual-drawer air fryers, which are usually around 8-10L/QTS. Their cooking space is split between two drawers, which you can control separately.

However, the Ninja Foodi FlexDrawer (FlexBasket in the US) has a convertible cooking space you can split into two separate cooking drawers or use as one cooking “megazone”. In the UK, it has an overall 10.4-litre capacity. In the US, the equivalent FlexBasket is 7QT.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

This isn’t Ninja’s only innovative dual-drawer model. There’s also the DoubleStack, which turns a conventional dual-drawer model on its side to provide 9.5L/10QT of cooking space across the two drawers – but with a much more compact countertop footprint. If you already know you want a Ninja air fryer, have a look at our round-of of the best Ninja air fryers and countertop cookers to find the right model for you.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

Dual-drawer or dual-basket air fryers solve the biggest problem of single-drawer air fryers, which is that you can only cook one dish at a time in them. Buy a dual-drawer appliance and you’ll be able to cook two dishes simultaneously, using different temperatures or cooking modes. Most also have a “sync finish” option to ensure that both dishes are ready at the same time, for the easiest cooking and dishing up possible.

Have a look at our round-up of the best dual-drawer air fryers for our top buying recommendations.

The biggest air fryer models tend to be air fryer ovens. These are essentially mini countertop ovens, with a glass-panelled, pull-down door and interior space for a number of cooking racks. The largest model we’ve tested is the HySapientia air fryer oven, which has a 24-litre/26QT capacity.

These will still be cheaper to run than an inbuilt oven but not nearly as energy-efficient as a single-drawer model.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

Where can you buy an air fryer?

Air fryers are now available from most online retailers. Most prices cluster at around $100/£100, although you can buy them much more cheaply. Prices for larger, multifunctional models go up to around $275/£275.

At the budget end of the range, you’ll get a basic air fryer with a smaller internal capacity. At the top end of the range, you’ll get more internal space, digital controls, preset cooking programmes, plus other cooking options, such as grilling and baking.

US retailers

UK retailers

To see our most recommended air fryer models, check out our round-up of the best air fryers across all types and models, the best dual-drawer air fryers, the best air fryer ovens and the best Ninja air fryers we’ve tested.