Air fryers are a great option if you find yourself impatiently waiting for your oven to preheat or wish your oven-baked fries and chicken wings were a little crispier. These compact appliances don't require much more space than a microwave and work very well for crisping leftover pizza, preparing pre-packaged French fries or chicken nuggets, and making a quick side dish of crispy Brussels sprouts or cauliflower.
While air-fried food isn't the same as deep-fried food, airflow inside the cooking chamber helps with quick cooking and crisping. Plus, some air fryers are versatile enough to work like small ovens. Air fryers with a wide range of temperature settings and fan speeds can roast, bake, and dehydrate, which is great if you want to avoid heating your big oven on a hot day.
Air fryers come in a variety of shapes and sizes. Multi-cooker air fryers bring in more functions, like slow cooking. Dual-drawer models let you cook different foods on each side of the air fryer, so you can prepare your main dish and a side at once or keep vegetarian and meat-eater meals separate.
The best air fryers produce evenly well-cooked, crispy, and golden-brown food. They preheat and cook your food fast and offer a wide range of settings for different recipes and cooking methods.
While the capacity of the air fryers we've tested varies from 2 to 10 quarts, bigger is better when it comes to performance. Unlike in a deep fryer, you won't get the best results by filling the basket with ingredients — instead, you'll want to arrange your food in a single layer as much as possible. You may want a bigger air fryer, even if you only cook for a few people. Baskets that are square instead of round and shallow instead of deep also offer a bigger cooking surface area.
We've tested 20 air fryers, and you'll find our recommendations for the best ones below. For more options, you can also check out the best large capacity air fryers and the best small air fryers. Once you've found the right model for your crispy foods, you might want the best microwave for your popcorn or reheating needs or the best blender for your morning smoothies and homemade soups.