The Best Air Fryers, From a Mini for One to a 9-Quart for a Family

The TurboBlaze is the air fryer to buy if you want one machine that covers everything a basket air fryer does well. Its 6-quart square basket is Cosori's middle size, and the heater runs from 90°F, low enough to proof bread dough, up to 450°F. That is the highest top temperature of the single-basket picks here, and 50 degrees above the Instant.

The fan is the difference you can't see. Cosori uses a DC motor with five speeds and assigns one to each of the nine programs (Air Fry, Roast, Bake, Broil, Dehydrate, Frozen, Proof, Reheat and Keep Warm), which Cosori says is how it controls how much moisture the food loses. You can't pick a speed yourself. That keeps the controls simple, but it means choosing the right program matters more here than on a machine with one fan speed.

The basket and crisper plate are ceramic-coated, which Cosori describes as PFAS-free, and both go in the dishwasher. It takes 11.8 by 14.4 inches of counter with the handle, almost exactly the Instant's footprint, as the floor plans show, and it weighs 13.2 pounds. Against the Pro LE you pay for one more quart, a stronger heater (1,725 watts against 1,500) and the ceramic coating; against the Instant you give up the window and gain 50 degrees.

The Vortex Plus ClearCook is for the cook who pulls the basket every two minutes to see whether the fries are done. Instant set a window into the front of the basket and put a light inside the machine, on its own button, so you can check the browning without opening the drawer and letting the heat out.

Everything else is a capable 6-quart air fryer. It has six programs (air fry, roast, broil, bake, reheat and dehydrate), lets you save your own time and temperature for each of them, and shows a Turn Food prompt partway through so you remember to shake the basket. The heater is 1,700 watts. Dehydrate runs as low as 95°F for as long as 72 hours, the longest timer of any pick here, which makes it the better choice if jerky and dried fruit are on your list.

The cost of the window is heat. Air Fry tops out at 400°F, 50 degrees below the Cosori TurboBlaze and Pro LE, and that difference shows most in the last few minutes, when you want color on wings or frozen food. It takes 11.8 by 14.9 inches of counter and stands 13 inches tall, the tallest machine here. Instant doesn't list its weight on the product page or in the manual, which is why the weight chart has a gap.

One quirk in Instant's own price list: the plain Vortex Plus 6-quart, without the window, lists for more than this one.

The Pro LE fits a 5-quart basket into the smallest body of the full-size picks: 10.7 by 10.8 inches by Cosori's measure, against 11.8 by 14.4 for the TurboBlaze. That figure appears to leave out the basket handle, which on Cosori's other models adds two to three inches of depth, so allow for it when you measure. Even then it is the smallest full-size footprint here.

It gives up one quart to the TurboBlaze and none of the heat: the range runs from 170°F to 450°F. The heater is smaller, 1,500 watts against 1,725, and Cosori's page for it says nothing of the TurboBlaze's per-program fan speeds. Cosori rates it under 55 decibels and puts the controls on a glass panel angled up toward you, so you can read it from above. It weighs 10 pounds.

Cosori's manual describes the basket as aluminum with a nonstick coating; it doesn't call it ceramic, as it does for the TurboBlaze and TwinFry. Cosori lists the Pro LE for three to five people, the same as the 6-quart TurboBlaze. Read it as a good size for two or three. Cosori says the basket takes a whole 4-pound chicken.

It is also the least expensive full-size pick at its maker's list price.

The TwinFry is two air fryers when you need two and one big one when you don't. A removable divider splits its 9-quart basket into two 4.5-quart zones, each with its own time and temperature. Take the divider out and you have one basket that Cosori says fits a whole chicken. Sync makes two zones finish at the same moment, so the fries and the chicken come out together, and Match copies one zone's settings to the other.

That flexibility is what fixed two-drawer models lack. Cosori's own 9-Quart Dual Basket, and Ninja's DualZone 8-Quart, have two separate drawers that can't be joined, so a roast or a big batch of wings has to fit in half the machine.

It also runs hotter than anything else here, from 95°F up to 465°F, on 1,750 watts, and the basket and crisper plates carry the same ceramic coating as the TurboBlaze, which Cosori describes as PFAS-free. The cost is space: 19 inches on its long side and 11.9 on the other with the handle, about a third more counter than the 6-quart picks, and 17.2 pounds to move. Look at the floor plans before you order. For a family of four that eats one dish at a time, a single 6-quart basket cooked in two rounds still does the job in less room.

If you cook for one, a big basket mostly heats air. The Lite 2.1-Quart is sized for a single person, in Cosori's own words, and takes 8.3 by 10.1 inches of counter with the handle: the smallest footprint here, and well under half the TwinFry's. At 4.87 pounds it is light enough to keep in a cupboard and bring out when you need it, which a 13-pound machine never is.

The small size sets the limits. There are four programs (air fry, roast, bake and reheat), the heater draws 900 watts, and the top temperature is 400°F, the same as the Instant. Cosori rates it below 48 decibels, the lowest figure any maker gives for a model here.

It suits the jobs a solo cook does most: a portion of frozen fries or nuggets, a chicken breast, last night's pizza brought back crisp. Cosori also pitches it as a second machine for a family's side dishes. For that job, look at the TwinFry first; one machine with a divider takes less counter than two.