I ate only air fryer food for 24 hours thanks to this dual-basket air fryer — and it was the best decision I’ve ever made

Large families require a lot of feeding — and a dual-zone air fryer like the Cosori Dual Basket could be one of the quickest and easiest ways to accomplish that. The best air fryers cook evenly, quickly, and are easy to use.

The Cosori Dual Basket has two and a half of those things: it cooks evenly and quickly, although it’s quite finicky to use. You’ll need to master the art of trial and error to get the best out of it — in fairness, much like you’d expect on a conventional oven.

Like other air fryers, it has a range of modes: roast, grill, air fry, and dehydrate, alongside the less impressive preheat and reheat. I tested all of these with a wide variety of foods, which I’ll discuss in full below. So, is the supersize Cosori air fryer worth its $169 price tag? Find out in this Cosori Dual Basket air fryer review.

Cosori Dual Basket Air Fryer: Cheat sheet

• Who is it for? Air fryer enthusiasts with a decent chunk of kitchen space free
• What does it do well? It cooks evenly and quickly
• What are its weaknesses? It takes a little more trial and error than other air fryers I’ve used
• What should you use it for? Everything — it can replace your conventional oven, no problems

Cosori Dual Basket Air Fryer: Specs

Cosori Dual Basket Air Fryer review: Price & availability

The Cosori Dual Basket air fryer is $169 at Amazon U.S. and £199 at Amazon U.K.. This is pretty pricey for an air fryer — the Ninja Foodi DualZone is $179 and has a removable divider, so isn’t restricted to two baskets like the Cosori.

My personal air fryer, the Philips 2000 Series, is just $99. This air fryer has a capacity of 6.6QT in one basket compared to the Cosori Dual Basket’s 4.5QT per basket. While the Cosori has an overall capacity of 9QT, its individual baskets aren’t big enough to roast a whole chicken, unlike the Philips.

The Instant Pot Vortex Plus is a dual basket air fryer with an overall 8QT capacity, and will set you back $219 — but its controls are more intuitive than the Cosori Dual Basket. The Philips 3000 Series Dual Basket air fryer is $199, which appears to be one of the priciest dual basket air fryers.

Cosori Dual Basket Air Fryer review: Design & setup

The Cosori Dual Basket air fryer looks like a treat. It’s smooth and sleek, with a monochromatic black finish, and two windows. I’ve said before that I’ll only buy air fryers with windows from now on — and it’s still so true. I love a window.

It’s quite large, at 17 inches long, so I wouldn’t recommend it for small kitchens, but it would be a great option for larger family homes.

Unlike the Ninja Foodi DualZone, the Cosori Dual Basket has two separate baskets. There’s no removable divider, so you can’t transform this air fryer into one large basket. While this makes it a little more restrictive than the Ninja Foodi DualZone, each basket is still quite large, at 4.5QT compared to the Ninja’s 3.5QT.

What I found most disappointing about the Cosori Dual Basket air fryer are its counter-intuitive controls. Often, once I’d set up both sides, I couldn’t then alter settings afterwards. I had to turn the air fryer off and back on again to reset the settings.

This was quite frustrating to use, and would be difficult to maneuver in a busy household. The ‘Sync Cook’ and ‘Sync Finish’ settings often didn’t work. When I pressed ‘Sync Cook’, if I decided I wanted to change the settings, I had to do the aforementioned reset.

While controlling the individual baskets was a little frustrating, I enjoyed how easy it was to rifle through modes. To change presets, you simply press the touch controls. The air fryer responds relatively instantaneously, but it’s not as intuitive or responsive as my Philips 2000 Series, or even the beginner-friendly Ultenic K10 ($79).

As with cooking, which I’ll discuss in the ‘Cooking performance’ section below, mastering the controls and setup requires some trial and error. The Cosori Dual Basket air fryer wouldn’t be my first recommendation for a beginner-friendly air fryer — that title would also go to the Philips 2000 Series, or Ultenic K10.

Cosori Dual Basket Air Fryer review: Cooking performance

Given that the Cosori Dual Basket Air Fryer has a range of different cooking modes, I tested a variety of food that kept me and my colleagues full all day long.

Air fry

As the Cosori Dual Basket air fryer is too small to roast a whole chicken as per our usual testing, I cooked a crown of chicken instead.

The package instructions recommended 430°F for 55 minutes, but I cooked at 350°F for 35 minutes and it was a little too done. However, the inside of the chicken was still moist and juicy, and the air fryer basket drained a decent amount of grease.

Next, I cooked curly fries. I filled the basket to the maximum capacity. The package advised 22 minutes at 380°F, but I had to cook them for 35 minutes with three shakes throughout. They were a little too hard, so I’d recommend cooking for less time, or keeping a better eye than me.

Lastly, I air fried sausage rolls. I did a little experiment here: one basket I cooked at 350°F for 15 minutes, and the other at 400°F for 15 minutes.

The 350°F rolls were delicious and not too crispy on top, whereas the 400°F rolls were a little crispier, so the Cosori can cook for everyone’s preferences.

Bake

To test the ‘bake’ setting, I cooked pain au chocolats and red velvet cupcakes. I bought frozen pain au chocolats, which recommended cooking for 10-15 minutes at 350°F. I put them in the air fryer at 350°F, but in 7 minutes they had almost burnt on top, so I took them out.

They were still delicious, don’t get me wrong, but the insides were semi-raw/doughy and the top was veering towards charcoal city. I would definitely recommend practice runs with the Cosori Dual Basket before prepping family dinners for the first time.

After the burnt-and-raw-but-still-yummy pain au chocolats, I decided to make red velvet cupcakes. I prepared the cupcakes according to the package instructions and put them in at 320°F for 10 minutes, instead of the recommended 350°F for 15 minutes.

The lack of muffin tray meant that a few of the cupcakes were oddly-shaped, but they tasted delicious. They weren’t too crispy on top, and they were still a little moist in the middle. They were a little drier than I’d normally expect from cupcakes, but by no means were they bad. Again, you’d need to experiment to get the best texture, as with any conventional oven.

Roast

To give the ‘roast’ setting a good test, I cooked stuffed peppers. The package recommended 25 minutes, but they were done in just 15. The top was crispy and gooey, with the melted cheese and tomato mixture grilled to perfection.

There was no dryness or char to any part of the pepper. These peppers were probably the highlight of my testing.

Dehydrate

To test the dehydrate setting, I chopped up two apples into rounds and put them on the default temperature and time, which was 130°F for 6 hours. After a painstaking 6 hours, I opened the basket to reveal deliciously dehydrated apple rounds. This is a great setting to have to make healthy snacks for kids, like fruit leather.

Volume

I used DecibelX to measure the volume: at just 61dB, the Cosori Dual Basket is one of the quietest air fryers I’ve used. However, it’s worth noting that it’s not whisper-quiet, it’s just quieter than the Philips 2000 Series’ 67dB.

Cosori Dual Basket Air Fryer review: Storage & maintenance

As the Dual Basket air fryer is pretty large: 17 x 15 inches wide and high respectively, this makes it pretty impossible to fit in cramped kitchens, so I’d only recommend it for large family-sized kitchens.

The dual basket design means it would be good for large meals, too, as you could theoretically cook protein in one side and veggies or carbs in the other.

Cosori asserts that the baskets and provided grills are all dishwasher safe, which makes for an easy cleanup. I washed everything by hand and was pretty impressed with the nonstick coating, which enabled me to clean up in seconds.

Cosori Dual Basket Air Fryer review: Verdict

While mastering the finicky controls can feel a little frustrating, it’s worth it to push through. Like many kitchen gadgets, the Dual Basket seems to have a mind of its own sometimes, but this doesn’t get annoying enough to detract from the overall experience.

I was able to cook a literal feast of freezer and ready meal delights in the dual basket — simultaneously. I roasted chicken and fries at the same time, and made a load of cupcakes in one go.

For convenience, the Cosori air fryer is fantastic. Just bear in mind that learning the controls might make you a little irritated… but hopefully the chicken nuggets and fries you’re cooking will make it all better.