Anon buys an air fryer
Anon buys an air fryer
Oversized fan. A lot of toaster ovens already were able to do convection cooking, just need to move more air and provide a basket to call it an air fryer.
As a side note, I highly recommend a good toaster oven to everyone. It heats up so much faster than the normal oven, and when reheating things, it doesn’t ruin the texture like a microwave. And I don’t have to store separate toaster and air fryer.
I make knives so it’s the best thing for it. Small footprint, ease of use, and not a huge energy drain.
Though, I don’t cook food in the one I use for knives.
Mostly “bushcraft” knives. So they are fixed blade and full tang. Nothing special.
I honestly end up modifying knives I’ve gotten a hold of more than anything. Have one of those Ferrari chef knives I’ve modified for my own personal use.
I’m not here to convert you, but this is just as dismissive as OP. Yes it’s a convection oven. We also have a full size convection oven. It does not cook things as dramatically faster as an air fryer does. It’s not the same experience at all.
I say this as someone who literally said, “so it’s just a small convection oven” until we got one. We have used it literally every day since getting it ~2 years ago.
It’s not just any of these things:
There is so much air moving around in an air fryer that parchment paper without food holding it down gets immediately sucked against the circulating fan filter (which we learned the hard way) and lighter bits of food (like cooked bacon that you might toss in for a quick reheat) will swirl around inside the cook basket.
It may not be for everyone, but it absolutely does cook food faster than in a regular oven, sometimes by an astonishing amount. We have a short but significant list of things that we also think are noticeably better from an air fryer, and nothing I can think of that we’ve tried comes out worse.
Frozen stuff works great, everything from fries to eggrolls.
You will start to get an idea how long things take after you have it. Many things now have airfryer instructions, or there are lots of “how to make xxx in an airfryer” articles.
Generic airfryer instructions are usually pretty close for ours, but any given model may have its own cookbook with times for different sorts of things (ours does) and after awhile you’ll get a feel for how to nudge generic instructions to fit your model.
For a very small number of specific kinds of breaded things, I’ll spritz them with cooking spray when they go in to help them get more like they were fried in oil, but that’s really personal preference and I only do it on a couple of things.
Get one with a big enough basket. Things need to be cooked in a single layer. You can pack it pretty full, but single layer is important.
Mine also comes as an air grill and making hamburgers from frozen patties takes roughly 15 minutes, bonus it doesn’t make a mess on my stovetop and most of the fat drips at the bottom.
I like to bang your mom because she doesn’t make a mess on my stovetop and most of the fat drips at the bottom.
Huh. Neat.
It’s a small convection oven. Most ovens are not convection ovens, they’re fan ovens or gas ovens. The biggest downside to both of them is that what you’re mostly heating up is empty space.
I can practically fill my air fryer with enough food for one person. Clearly more efficient.
Also because of the small size it heats up basically instantly, none of this preheating the oven for 45 minutes before you can cook anything.
240v lets you pump more amps through smaller gauge wire, but since it’s an air fryer only needs to maintain a certain temperature, 120v is fine, and will not use any additional power over 240v. The amount of total watt hours used is what determines efficiency.
Where 240v is nice is with electric water kettles, where the higher voltage increases your wattage ceiling, letting you dump the energy into the water faster, and thus boiling it faster. A 120v electric kettle would use the same amount of total watt hours to boil the water, but because it’s heating it with a lower wattage output, it just takes longer.
Technology Connections did a good video on the subject.

It's not really a mystery.links 'n stuffMy video on 240V power in the US;https://youtu.be/jMmUoZh3Hq4This channel is supported through viewer contributions o...
Just buy this, it does everything you need if you are feeding 4 or less.
Instant Pot Duo Crisp 11-in-1 Air Fryer and Electric Pressure Cooker Combo with Multicooker Lids that Fries, Steams, Slow Cooks, Dehydrates,Free App With Over 800 Recipes, Black/Stainless Steel, 8QT a.co/d/8vKgQks
I got a duo crisp. I was leery because I was mainly into pressure cooking, but once I got all steel inserts (no teflon) I’ve unlocked a lot of utility with it. Cool thing for baking in cold months: put an inch of water in, set it to a 35c sous vide, and put your proofing bowl on top with a cover. The heat with an air gap is enough to keep yeast happy even in the dead of winter.
Between that, warming up leftovers, and baking things quickly, I’m happy with it.
Storing the lid can be a pain, but now I keep it on a hook and I’m smitten.
Link? My wife wants a bigger one, and I don’t want to use that much space on such a thing. Costco has this one, but it doesn’t fold up.
Are you maybe talking about the Ninja Foodi?
Cuisinart® makes air frying easier than ever, with presets to perfectly fry favorites like wings, fries, chicken nuggets, snacks and veggies. Frying with air instead of oil is delicious and guilt-free, and this large capacity oven fries up to 3 lb. at once. It also offers all the great features of a full-size toaster oven. And that’s not all! Unique to the Cuisinart® Digital Air Fryer Toaster Oven is a range of low temperatures that lets users proof dough, dehydrate foods and more, taking multi-functionality to a whole new level. With the large digital display and intuitive programming options, selecting presets, temperature, time, and function have never been easier.
I’m going to have to try replacing my microwave with my air fryer. We mostly use the microwave for reheating food, so I’m worried the fryer will dry things out too much. Any tips?
The other thing we use it for is popcorn, but we eat that almost exclusively in another room, so I could totally just move the microwave there (or get a dedicated air popper).
It is a bit more complicated than that. The WAY it moves the air is different than in a convection oven, so it “fries” a bit better.
This guy does a great breakdown of how it isn’t “just a convection oven”
Why not a microwave + oven + air fryer?
An air fryer is fantastic for things you’d normally cook in an oven, but it gets them way more crispy without all the oil. You can even “deep fry” by spritzing some oil on top.
If your oven has a convection feature, you can just use that, but it’s also way bigger (read: more energy to cook small portions).
Ok I hear you and offer the far superior, microwave + convection toaster oven (air fryer toaster oven ok just don’t get a bad one)
Toaster oven beats the issue of huge amount of wasted energy and heat and convection is basically 80% of the way to air fryer and also will make general baking faster and more even. So you can use them in place of the oven for lots of things.
Cheap air fryer toaster ovens are often crap though and more just garbage air fryer that opens differently. Don’t buy those.
Any idea if Cuisinart and Ninja air fryers are decent? I’m looking to upgrade to a larger one, and they have ones that look like toasters (Cuisinart and Ninja), but they’re advertised as air fryers.
I don’t really need a toaster since I just toast with my oven (has a “Toast” setting that uses the broiler), and even then that’s pretty rare.
Cuisinart® makes air frying easier than ever, with presets to perfectly fry favorites like wings, fries, chicken nuggets, snacks and veggies. Frying with air instead of oil is delicious and guilt-free, and this large capacity oven fries up to 3 lb. at once. It also offers all the great features of a full-size toaster oven. And that’s not all! Unique to the Cuisinart® Digital Air Fryer Toaster Oven is a range of low temperatures that lets users proof dough, dehydrate foods and more, taking multi-functionality to a whole new level. With the large digital display and intuitive programming options, selecting presets, temperature, time, and function have never been easier.
Cuisinart are perfectly awesome toaster ovens and even nice convection but their air frying is mostly just ok. I think their budget options are their best stuff since will work just as well and is as reliable as Cuisinart gets.
Ninja has some kind of secret sauce cause their air frying capabilities in their toaster ovens puts single purpose air fryers to shame. Shockingly good but I am always concerned about longevity since they always seem seconds away from throwing the baby out with the bathwater if they think they have a new device to sell. But these toaster ovens do seem to last. And it’s hard to make them proprietary like other products.
Tl;Dr: if you mostly just care about having a larger more capable air fryer ninja is your answer and they work great. If you want max size the Foodi XL is good and can be got on sale for around the same price as the smaller flip up one but is far more usable as an oven and more.
Edit: I own the new Ninja double oven air toaster oven and love it but I also bought it from a store that sells dented or returned items for half price and it’s my 4th air fryer toaster oven I have ever owned.