Short test report Sharp Airfryer with double drawer: compact and budget-friendly

Price upon review

Not available in the US

Dual tray air fryers are usually large appliances that take up a correspondingly large chunk of counter space. But that doesn’t necessarily have to be the case. Sharp’s Double Tray Air Fryer has an 8-quart capacity, but thanks to its squarer shape, it uses empty counter space in the front to provide more cooking capacity while using less of the length of your countertop.

With a width of 37.5 cm, it is more than 10 cm shorter than the Ninja Flex draweralthough it is only a few inches shorter than the Ninja Foodi Max Dual Drawer, and both have a slightly larger capacity of 10 liters.

Design and construction

• Dishwasher safe drawers and trays
• Easily accessible controls
• Touchscreen buttons require pressure

The air fryer is made of black plastic, with a glossy finish for the control panel and a matte finish for the housing. The dimensions are surprising: 37.5 cm wide, 36 cm deep and only 30 cm high, so it will not dominate your counter. It sits against the wall and, despite its depth, leaves a fair amount of pull-out space at the front. The lower height means the control panel isn’t as close to the bottom of standard kitchen cabinets – which can be a problem with some air fryer models.

The control panel slopes from the top to approximately 27 cm from the bottom of the air fryer, so that even a smaller person can easily reach it. It is also easy to use. There is a reminder strip on the panel itself, so you can easily see which automatic setting corresponds to which function: whether it’s fries, chicken, fish or pizza.

There are two digital panels that display the function you’ve chosen for a specific drawer, along with the time and temperature settings, with a sync/dual button in between. Below each panel is a set of touchscreen buttons that allow you to select the different programs, time and temperature for the tray. You do need a bit of pressure on these buttons – even more than normal – so that you can get a bit of a front seat.

Below the control panel are the two 4L drawers, which are next to each other. They have sturdy handles with a silver edge and a nice pull-out and click movement.

The drawers contain two vegetable drawers, which are non-stick and dishwasher safe. These containers, which have a high-quality, smooth non-stick surface, have beautiful black rubber feet on each of the four corners, which look like they will stand the test of time.

You also get a manual and the warranty. The manual is a bit thin. While it will give you an overview of the different features, it will still be a matter of trial and error.

The cord is not very long, so you have to place the air fryer relatively close to a socket.

Performance and features

• 12 preset programs
• 8 cooking modes
• Double sync capability

Installation is simple: place the air fryer, rinse the drawers and containers and then connect it. We recommend that you read the manual first, as the controls are not entirely self-explanatory.

There are two ways to choose the cooking function for the drawers. You can use one of the presets via the car menu, or you can use the function button.

The automatic menu has twelve presets: fries, beef, vegetables, whole chicken, bacon, fish, potato, pizza, chicken nuggets, shrimp, snacks and sandwich. Choose one and it will provide a fixed time and temperature. Then just press start to start the program. You can change the time and temperature of these presets if desired, but you cannot increase the cooking time by more than 30% to prevent food from burning.

Alternatively, you can use the function button. You can choose from air frying, baking, roasting, frozen cooking, dehydrating, keeping warm, preheating or reheating. You choose one of these functions, then use the temperature/time button to choose the heat and time and then simply press start.

The central synchronization/dual button allows you to copy a setting from one drawer to another. After setting the function and time in the left tray, you can copy it to the right. However, when you start cooking, pressing the sync/dual button will end both cooking functions in each drawer at the same time.

There is a bit of a learning curve in the controls. We had trouble figuring out how to cancel a program after accidentally copying it from one drawer to another when we tried to set the cooking end times to sync.

We started by cooking a burger and fries in separate drawers, followed by toasting a burger bun. The fries were prepared according to automatic menu A01 and came out golden brown, crispy and hot. The burger was cooked for 20 minutes in the air fry setting at 180°C and the result was good: hot, juicy on the inside and crispy on the outside. We synchronized the cooking times so that the programs ended together.

The bun was cooked at A12 for a toasted sandwich, but only five minutes, and it came out golden brown and crispy.

Then we cooked chicken legs and fried potatoes: the chicken legs on A04 and the potatoes on A07. The chicken legs were crispy and steaming hot, and the potatoes were crispy, hot and fluffy inside, although we had to take them out before the end of the cooking time for perfect results.

Alex Greenwood / Foundry

Alex Greenwood / Foundry

Alex Greenwood / Foundry

Next up was a cheese toastie on the A12 – the result was crispy, the cheese was very melted and we felt we should probably have taken it out a little earlier.

We also cooked a single breaded cod fillet in the air fryer at 180°C for 20 minutes, and the convenience of just popping it open, setting the program and not returning until the beep sounded was great. The fish crumb was crunchy, the fish inside was hot and undercooked.

The cooking program automatically pauses when you pull out the drawer, and starts again when you put the drawer back.

We must say that cooking with the Sharp Double Tray Air Fryer is easy and convenient. You can use just one drawer, or both for different types of food, and set it to full cooking at the same time.

But there is a price to pay for the compact design and that is capacity and flexibility. Each drawer only has a 4 liter capacity and this unfortunately means that you can’t get a typical garlic baguette from the supermarket into a drawer without chopping it in half. You can store such a baguette in a full 8-liter drawer by placing it diagonally.

Likewise, we found that a 4-quart tray only fits about five chicken legs (or ten if you double the size of the second tray), so this is really an air fryer for a smaller household or a busy household where meals need to be prepared. prepared regularly in small quantities.

It is also incredibly easy to clean. The non-stick coating on both the drawers and the containers and the smaller size make washing up a lot easier because cooking residues do not stick to the surface. We didn’t even bother putting them in the dishwasher.

Price and availability

If you can get by with a two-drawer air fryer with a lower capacity than Ninja models, the Sharp model is a great buy. Although it has an RRP of £169.99, it can be had for much less. At the time of writing, Appliances Direct has it for just £99. It’s also available from Robert Dyas for £122.99 and from Debenhams for £124.99.

The latest 10 liter dual zone Ninja Foodi Max (see our review) costs around £170-£200, so the Sharp model is very good value. But if you want to see how it compares to other air fryers we recommend, check out our reviews of the best air fryers, the best Ninja air fryers and, for more cooking capacity, the best air fryers. fryer ovens.

Should you buy the Sharp Double Tray Digital Air Fryer?

We are very pleased with the Sharp digital air fryer with double drawer of 8 liters and synchronized finish. It’s good value and suits the lifestyle of a smaller, busy household who may not always need a whole 8 liter drawer, but may want to prepare smaller meals or smaller meals with two types of food in different drawers. We also feel that this air fryer would be suitable for a one-person household, and wouldn’t overwhelm a smaller galley kitchen.

The only downside is that there will be some items that you may find difficult to fit into one of the drawers, but overall this is a very good air fryer that will suit a certain type of household perfectly.