Air fryers are essential if you are looking for healthier and easier ways to cook your favorite foods - guilt-free fries and roast potatoes? However, with so many models to choose from, which vary greatly in price and size, choosing the best model for your needs can seem a bit confusing.
Most fryers are sold with slide baskets or bowls and with digital or manual controls, while some have separate compartments that allow you to cook multiple foods at once.
Deep fryers, like those in the Tefal Actifry range, tend to offer larger capacities and glass trays to keep an eye on your food. This bowl design also means that the cooking juice tends to stay in the fryer and in contact with food.
Basket fryers are generally healthier because they drain juice and fat from food, but because these baskets are on wheels and stored inside the fryer, you cannot control your food without it. Open it up and let it in cold air. .
Both types of fryers work in the same way as traditional ovens. Hot air is generated in the basket or bowl and distributed by a fan to cook food evenly. This means that deep fryers can be used to grill or cook just about anything you can cook in a regular oven, space permitting.
Speaking of space, the other points to consider when choosing an air fryer are capacity, machine size, and value for money. Larger air fryers, with a capacity of about 6 liters, are ideal for feeding a family of four, but fryers with a capacity as small as 2.5 liters can still cook a decent amount of food.
You can pay up to € 330 / € 250 for popular fryers, but as our tests show, this doesn't always guarantee the best results.
We spent a month testing the effectiveness of fryers and chicken wings, their ease of use, the power of their fans, and their everyday practicality to help you find the perfect machine for easier use. healthier life with frying in the air.
(Image credit: future)
Wilko 4L Air Fryer
An economical fryer that far exceeds its weight.
Easy to use
Broken price
Give tasty fries
Strong fan
Heats up to the touch while cooking
Low cooking time
Wilko is an unknown hero in the world of kitchen appliances. It constantly offers quality products at unbeatable prices. Their slow cooker is the best we've ever used, their blender is highly rated, and their air fryer is no exception. For € 40, you get a well-designed, easy-to-use machine that makes crispy fries with fluffy centers and tasty chicken wings with thinner skin and moist meat.
It doesn't offer as many programs and settings as some of its more expensive competitors, instead opting for a manual timer that fires smoothly during the countdown and for a high-temperature dial. The timer only runs for 30 minutes, half the time of most other air fryers on the market, but its maximum temperature matches that of most of its rivals, with a temperature of up to 200 ° C. The lack of digital controls is one of the sacrifices you make for the cheaper price of the Wilko air fryer, another is the fact that it gets very hot to the touch during cooking. On the plus side, the steering wheels make the Wilko incredibly easy to use.
From a design point of view, it is relatively compact, especially since its small format contains a large 4L container with a basket. Its glossy black housing allows it to blend easily on a countertop. It can also be stored in a closet if space is limited or if it will not be used regularly.
(Image credit: future)
Tefal Genius Actifry
Actifry forgoes some of the health benefits of air frying for the sake of incredible taste.
Give crispy fries and wet chicken.
Rotating paddle helps cook food evenly
The glass tray allows you to monitor your food.
Big body
expensive
Making fries and chicken wings tastier than anything we could make in our conventional oven, Tefal's Actifry Genius XL is our air fry king. The fries were so good we would have thought they came from a fries shop. The chicken was moist, while its skin was crispy and retained all its flavor. However, she can't make it to the top of our list of the best deep fryers, as its price, large size, and noisy fan hurt her culinary prowess.
It has a flatter and deeper shape than the tall design of its rivals. The advantage of this is that it is easy to install on workbenches under kitchen cabinets and allows you to place a glass "window" on top of the machine that allows you to keep an eye on what you are doing. cooking. Heat is also generated on the back of the machine, which means it doesn't get too hot to the touch. The downside to this design is that it does not fit easily in a closet due to its depth.
The enhanced flavor of their fries and chicken wings is due in large part to their bowl design and rotating paddle. While the Wilko gives you the option of using the bowl or the basket, the only option with the Tefal is to let the food cook in its own juice, even if the removable paddle moves them around the bowl. This increases the fat content because it doesn't wash it down, but it also improves the overall flavor and saves you from cleaning a separate grease trap.
(Image credit: future)
Multi-kitchen Ninja Foodi
Ninja's industrial-looking machine beast is highly versatile, but its price tag is high.
Very versatile
Great capacity
Good range of settings
Complicated to use
expensive
The Ninja Foodi is technically classified as a multi-purpose cooker because beyond air frying, it allows you to cook, grill, sauté and grab, and it also triples as a slow cooker and pressure cooker. It also has one of the quietest fans of all the fryers we use. As you'd expect from such a versatile and well-built machine, it's a real beast, takes up a lot of counter space, and has a somewhat industrial (read: ugly) look.
One of the main advantages of this solution is that it offers a large capacity, enough to easily cook food to feed a large family or guests, and the Ninja Foodi can be used with a bowl or basket, as well as for cooking of cakes through of a removable grill. The downside is that multiple configurations, accessories, and the fact that there are two different covers to choose from, depending on the function used, make it a complex machine to master.
For the purposes of this group test, we only tested the Foodi air fryer function. This gave a delicious chicken, but disappointed in producing overly crispy fries that were crispy on the outside but lacked the smooth interior of their rival fries. It comes with an hour timer and offers the highest maximum temperature of fryers tested at 210 ° C.
We also used the cook and broil tool, as well as the slow cook feature, and while its performance in these areas isn't entirely relevant here, it's an overall impressive kit, and for the price, this should be it.
(Image credit: future)
Digital Princess Family Air Fryer
The Goldilocks air fryers that offer something for everyone
Intuitive numeric controls
Elegant design
Compact construction
Fries and chicken
If the Ninja Foodi offers too much, the manual controls on the Wilko offer too little, and the Tefal is not healthy enough for you, the Princess Digital Family Aerofryer may be right for you. Among all the models on this list, the princess stands out by offering a wide range of digital settings via its touchscreen without being too fiddly. It is also available in two sizes, 3.2L and 5.2L, and has a maximum timer setting of one hour.
We tested the larger of the two models and, despite having a similar capacity to the bulky Swan, the Princess is better suited to our kitchen, both in size, it is a bit more compact than the Swan, and with its design. Elegant black. . It wasn't the quietest air fryer we used, but it wasn't the loudest either, and it also made the difference of not feeling too hot while cooking.
The Princess Digital chips weren't quite as fluffy as others on this list, but it did give them tasty skin. Likewise, their chicken was crispy on the outside, but a little dry on the inside.
(Image credit: future)
Air 5 Swan Manual Fryer
A quiet and easy-to-use fryer.
The calmest in the test
Easy to use
Inconsistent cooking results
The Swan 5L Air Fryer is the quietest we've tested, and with the same manual controls as the Wilko Air Fryer, it's just as easy to use. The shape and design of the Swan's fryer are nearly identical to the Wilko model and share the same 30-minute timer; In fact, there is little difference between the specifications of the two machines, so you pay a little more for the extra liter of Swan capacity and some design changes.
For this higher price, we expected an improvement in the Wilko's cooking skills, but the Swan failed to match the performance of its rival. Some of their fries were delicious, others were soggy. Cooking the chicken wings was more effective, but again, the inconsistency had let him down, some of the wings were some of the best we've ever had, while others were dry and lacking crisp skin. It's a shame, because the swan is clearly capable of great things, it's a bit of a success.
The other main difference between the two models is that the Swan is larger, due to its extra liter capacity, and the version we tested was bright red compared to Wilko's classic black case, so it couldn't not suitable for all kitchens or all tastes.
However, if you are a fan of design and especially if you think that Wilko's 4-liter capacity is not enough, the Swan is always good value for money. It is also available in black and cream, as well as a digital version, but the latter two are currently out of stock on various websites.