5 Best Small Air Fryers That Won't Dominate Your Countertop, According to Experts

• Dash Compact Air Fryer: Dash's small air fryer is a solid compact option for one to two people. However, we found the basket a little too small, and it doesn't have as many cooking modes as our picks above.
• Dash Digital Tasti-Crisp Air Fryer 2.6 Qt.: This air fryer has a minimal footprint, but its small basket made flipping food difficult, and it didn’t crisp or brown food as well as expected.
• Dash Tasti-Crisp Infrared Air Fryer: Infrared heat makes this model faster than other air fryers, but the basket feels cramped.
• Laura Ashley 4.75-quart Air Fryer: Cottagecore fans will love this floral air fryer's design, but it didn’t produce the crispy results we expected during testing.
• Our Place Wonder Oven: Our Place's model is a cute, retro-style air fryer toaster oven, but we found the controls difficult to use and noticed a slight chemical smell when it heated.
• Philips 2000 Series Air Fryer 4.2 L: This air fryer has an impressive 13 cooking functions and performed well in our tests for crispy, even browning. However, it has a smaller basket than our top picks. ​

In the Kitchen Lab, we’ve tested over 70 air fryers of all shapes and sizes. We evaluate their ease of use and how well they cook foods that home cooks typically prepare in an air fryer.

✔️ Wings and fries tests: We air fry frozen fries and chicken wings to see how quickly they cook and how evenly browned and crisp they get. We also evaluate how moist and tender the food comes out.

✔️ Grilled cheese and mozzarella stick tests: We air fry grilled cheese sandwiches and frozen mozzarella sticks to assess how evenly the machines melt cheese and produce a gooey, cheese-pull-worthy result with a crispy exterior. This test also shows whether the fan is so strong that it blows food around inside the basket.

✔️ Ease of use: We evaluate each model’s control panel and buttons, including cooking modes, temperature settings, alerts, and how easy it is to move the basket or trays. Finally, we consider how easy the machine and its parts are to clean and maintain.

✔️ Size: Average air fryers have a capacity of around 6 quarts. They can fit enough food for about four people at a time. The small air fryers on our list hold 2 to 4 quarts. They’re great for one or two people and require less counter space. We also find them easier to clean since the smaller baskets often fit in a dishwasher. Here’s how to deep-clean your appliance to help it run smoothly.

✔️ Style: Small air fryers come in basket- and toaster oven-style. Basket styles are great for smaller ingredients that benefit from shaking, while toaster ovens have trays with a larger cooking surface to hold more food in a single layer. This can produce better browning and crisping. Toaster oven trays are also a little easier to flip food on, since they have shorter walls. Air fryer toaster ovens also offer more versatility since they can bake, toast, and more, like a standard countertop oven.

✔️ Mechanical vs. digital display: Air fryers with dials rather than a digital display cost less than their counterparts. They work perfectly well, but are often less precise. They also typically have fewer bells and whistles, such as preprogrammed settings and halfway timers that remind you to flip your food.

✔️ Settings: Often, when an air fryer offers an extensive range of settings, it includes programs with preset times and temperatures for commonly air-fried foods. Usually, you can adjust these settings further. They can be helpful if you’re new to air frying, but the more you use your appliance, the easier it will be to use the manual function. Another thing to keep in mind is that settings often indicate how low or high an air fryer can go. For example, a dehydrate setting might mean the air fryer can cook at 100°F or less. Keep warm is usually around 200°F, air fry typically maxes out around 400°F, and roast or broil is usually higher.

Round air fryer baskets offer less cooking area than square ones. Based on testing, a 2-quart air fryer can fit two to three chicken thighs snugly. You can also pile in a pound of fries, though 8 ounces yields more consistently crisp results. You can fit at least a pound of wings, which is about 10 pieces. Square baskets can fit a little more and offer more room to spread ingredients out for better airflow.

The product description often provides a good indication of the food capacity, but we recommend consulting the user guide for recommended amounts.

Lizzy Briskin is a contributing analyst in the Kitchen Lab. She’s a trained chef and recipe developer who has tested dozens of air fryers, large and small. She prefers making toast in an air fryer to any other appliance (you can pre-butter it!).

Nicole Papantoniou is the senior director of the Good Housekeeping Kitchen & Cooking Lab, where she oversees all content and testing related to cooking tools, gadgets, and appliances. She has been testing air fryers since before they entered the U.S. market. As Good Housekeeping's lead air fryer tester, she has tested a wide range of air fryers, including basket-style, oven-style, and air fryer toaster oven models, as well as those built into ovens, microwaves, and more. She has developed air fryer recipes and uses them often at home.