Zwilling air fryer review: A compact, snack-friendly air fryer

Zwilling is well known for its quality kitchen tools so it was only a matter of time before the brand introduced its first air fryer. The simply named Zwilling 4L air fryer is a compact model, ideal for single households and couples.

It’s very much a “what you see is what you get” air fryer. It comes with manual time and temperature options, as well as a handful of preset functions for common dishes such as chips, fish, poultry and more and it’s a great option for those with small kitchens and not enough space for the huge, bulky air fryers we’re used to seeing.

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Zwilling air fryer review: What do you get for the money?

The Zwilling air fryer has a four-litre capacity, making it large enough for up to three modest portions. It comes with a removable grill plate, suitable for cooking things such as burgers or fish fillets, which also acts as a barrier for draining off excess oil to the basket below.

Measuring 291 x 347 x 300mm (WDH) and weighing 3.9kg, it’s one of the most compact and lightest air fryers I’ve reviewed. Its sleek, plastic body and slightly rounded design isn’t anything groundbreaking but I rather like its uncomplicated approach. The responsive touchscreen on top is a nice touch, too, and allows you to control the fryer’s various settings quickly and easily.

There are six preset functions for cooking common meals, including fries, chicken, fish fillets, seafood, cake and pizza. These set the cook time and temperature for you automatically, allowing you to get cooking in just a couple of taps. Alternatively, you can adjust these settings manually, with a maximum cook time of 30 minutes and a maximum temperature of 200ºC.

While its £139 price tag puts it firmly in the mid-range for air fryers, its capacity and feature set are more similar to that of a budget model. For a similar price, the Ninja Air Fryer AF100UK 3.8L air fryer (£149) gives you a little more flexibility, as it can also roast, dehydrate and reheat. Similarly, the 5.7L single-drawer Instant Pot Vortex Plus (£120) also functions as a grill and oven with a variety of additional settings, including a reheat option.

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Zwilling air fryer review: What’s good about it?

Despite its simplicity, Zwilling’s first air fryer is well built with a robust design and an attractive, glossy touch screen. It’s small but perfectly formed.

While smaller capacity fryers aren’t hard to come by, finding a compact model in the mid- to high-performance range is surprisingly difficult. Zwilling’s air fryer manages to combine the best of both, combining top-tier performance and a small footprint. It’s also fairly energy efficient. In tests, it consumed 0.42kWh of electricity in 30 minutes of cooking when set to 200ºC, which, given its size, isn’t the most efficient fryer we’ve tested but still good and far better than your average oven.

Its preset functions, unlike many fryers, work well and can be used without too much tweaking. I was able to cook 500g of thin, homemade chips in around 15 minutes at 200ºC using the Fries setting without parboiling, although I did have to shake them several times during cooking to ensure they were evenly browned all over. With thicker chips, I couldn’t achieve the same results and found they were best when parboiled first.

I also achieved decent results with other foods including fish fillets, frozen nuggets and fries and even pizza. It’s not big enough to cook a two person pizza in its entirety, but it’s ideal for those little supermarket ones, or for reheating leftover slices.

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Zwilling air fryer review: What could be better?

One of the biggest limitations I found with this air fryer is its lack of flexibility during cooking. Every model I’ve tested in this price range and beyond allows you to adjust its time or temperature during the cooking cycle but you can’t do that here. Instead, you’ll have to wait for the fryer to run its full cooking cycle or turn off the fryer mid cook and start again – not ideal if you just want to bung a couple of extra minutes onto your cook time.

Another unusual thing is the fryer’s maximum cooking time of 30 minutes. This is quite short considering most models in this price range offer up to 60 minutes. For most meals, you’re probably not likely to need to cook ingredients for more than 30 minutes but it’s still worth keeping in mind.

It’s also worth noting that you can find higher capacity fryers that deliver equally competent results for the same price. So if your budget is limited, but not your kitchen space, you might find it more beneficial to opt for a larger model instead.

Zwilling air fryer review: Should you buy it?

If space saving is your number one priority, you could do a lot worse than Zwilling’s debut offering. The results are very good, whether you’re preparing frozen food, homemade fries, chicken or vegetables, and it’s quick and easy to use due to its preset functions.

It lacks the capacity and premium features of some of our favourites including the Instant Vortex and Ninja 4.8L both of which deliver superior value for money. Having said that, the Zwilling is a perfectly competent air fryer that delivers consistent results across a range of ingredients.