I cooked a variety of delicious meals in the Cosori Iconic Air Fryer, and it has earned a permanent place in my kitchen

I consider myself a decent cook, but I absolutely despise the clean-up afterward. And baking? That’s usually a definite pass for me. With my Italian background, I'm much more comfortable with the "intuitive cooking" approach.

Even though some of the best air fryers can be somewhat tricky to clean, the Cosori Iconic Air Fryer has surprisingly changed my mind. Its ease of clean-up has me cooking more meals more frequently, and I've even found myself motivated to bake with it.

In fact, I really don’t have anything negative to say about the Iconic. Every meal I’ve cooked in it has been delicious and cooked to perfection — once I learned that I had to shorten my cooking times due to the powerful heating element and motor. I even baked a cheesecake! I followed a recipe and everything!

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The Iconic has become a staple in my kitchen, and I imagine it will stay there for a long time because it’s so easy to use and produces such consistently delicious results. Here’s what happened.

Cosori Iconic Air Fryer review: Price and availability

The Iconic is available for purchase now for $249 at Amazon. Cosori offers free shipping, 30-day returns, and a 5-year limited warranty. It is also available for purchase at other retailers like Amazon and Best Buy.

Cosori Iconic Air Fryer review: Design

The Iconic Air Fryer’s exterior is made of stainless steel, while the top is tempered glass. All the touch-sensitive controls live beneath that glass. The basket slides out from the front of the unit and is also faced with stainless steel, as well as a large handle with a button-release on top. All told, it weighs 14.1 pounds, making it easy to move around the kitchen.

The 6.5-quart basket’s inside features a nonstick ceramic coating, and it’s dishwasher-safe. Cosori says you can feed 3-5 people with the basket’s capacity, though that, of course, depends largely on what you’re cooking.

The Iconic comes with a crisper plate that fits perfectly within the basket. It’s removable for easy cleaning, and it’s also dishwasher-safe.

All of the cooking functions rely upon a DC motor, which Cosori says is more powerful and energy-efficient than a traditional AC motor. There are six cooking functions: Air Fry, Roast, Bake, Dehydrate, Proof, and ReHeat.

There are five fan speeds, and temperature range settings from 90 degrees to 450 degrees. And you can operate the Iconic anywhere from 1 minute up to 24 hours.

Aside from the main unit and crisper plate, the Iconic doesn’t include any other accessories. However, it does come with a brief recipe book — a good place to start if you’ve never used an air fryer before.

Like other air fryers, the Iconic cooks food by using a powerful fan to circulate hot air around the food. The small basket makes this an efficient process. One of the big benefits of an air fryer is that the exterior of the food crisps quickly, sealing in moisture and providing an even cook on all sides. The crisper plate creates a gap between the bottom of the basket and your food, through which the hot air can circulate.

The heating element is situated above the fan at the top of the Iconic’s internal structure. The fan then transfers this heat downward toward the food in the basket. Cold air around the food is quickly forced away, allowing the hot air to crisp the outside of the food quickly.

Cosori Iconic Air Fryer review: Cooking performance

My biggest question when I took on the Iconic review was how much more convenient it could be over a conventional oven. It is, in a lot of ways, just a small oven, after all. But the forced air cooking system does have its benefits, as does the super small size of the cooking basket.

I found that cooking with the Iconic is vastly more convenient than a conventional oven for a lot of reasons. For starters, it’s far more efficient in terms of power use and cooking time. Since it’s small, it heats up quickly, using less power and getting to the important work of cooking almost immediately, rather than wasting lots of time and energy on pre-heating a larger space.

Secondly, the Iconic does an incredible job of crisping the outside of food, sealing in moisture and flavor. I cooked chicken thighs during my first use, and they came out exceptional — I would say even better than my usual method, which involves a cast-iron pan in the oven at a high temperature, usually 425 degrees or higher, for up to 40 minutes. With the Iconic, I had crispy, moist chicken thighs ready to eat after just 20 minutes of cooking.

After my initial success with chicken, I took the plunge and put a New York Strip steak into the oven. I don’t eat steak often, so when I do, I want it to be perfect, especially since beef is getting more and more expensive. The Iconic was up to the task.

The internet recommended 7 minutes per side for my cut of beef. I found this to be too long, however, and I ended up slightly overcooking the steak, even though I cut down the cooking time to five minutes on one side and three on the other. I ended up with a medium cook, though I much prefer medium rare.

The outside was crisped beautifully, almost as well as I could have done with a sear in a pan. On my second run through with steak, I did do a quick sear in a pan after cooking in the Iconic, and this time, it was an absolutely perfect finish.

To complement both the steaks and the chicken, I also cooked some potatoes sliced thin. I marinated them first, then tossed them in the basket with the crisper plate at the bottom. In just ten minutes, the potatoes were perfectly cooked: tender and soft in the middle, crispy on the outside.

Over the last few months of testing, the Iconic has become my go-to method of cooking chicken dinners. I’ve cooked a few steaks in it too, and even tried a cut of fish. The latter was a bit tougher to nail down in terms of cooking time, so I would recommend checking in frequently when you’re cooking fish. And a simple meat thermometer helps a lot with beef. Even better, a wireless meat thermometer is ideal so you can check on the internal meat temperature without opening the unit and letting out the heat.

Cosori Iconic Air Fryer review: Bread and baking

I love homemade bread, so I was thrilled to see there’s a proofing function on the Iconic. Basically, this is just a super-low setting. It automatically sets the Iconic at 90 degrees, and you can adjust the time to your liking. It defaults to 90 minutes.

The idea of proofing my bread and then just baking it right in the Iconic was super appealing. It didn’t quite work out that way, however. The proofing function is definitely handy if you want to cut down your proofing time. No complaints there.

But when it comes time to bake, you need to be very aware of how much your bread will rise. I kept my dough in the unit and then hit bake for 25 minutes. About 20 minutes in, I smelled burning. The bread had risen during baking and was touching the top of the unit.

The solution is, of course, to measure out the dough more carefully, so this isn’t an issue. I could have cut my dough in half and baked two loaves instead. Ultimately, this largely indicates there’s a learning curve to using the Iconic, as is the case with just about any air fryer.

The recipe book that comes with the Iconic includes a recipe for cheesecake. I’m not much of a baker, but I sure do love cheesecake. In fact, I’ve never actually made one before, so this seemed like a great opportunity.

I had to get a 7-inch spring pan, which proved surprisingly difficult. But once it arrived, I modified the cheesecake recipe slightly (I don’t love cottage cheese, so I subbed that out).

Once again, the cheesecake batter rose while it baked, and I ended up scorching the top a bit. Luckily, I had peeked in to see how it was coming along and shortened the recommended cooking time. Other than the thin layer on top, the rest of the cheesecake was cooked to perfection. Once again, the trick here seems to be keeping a very close eye on the food while it’s baking. A viewing window would be wonderful here. As it is, you’ll need to open the basket and peek in periodically.

Cosori Iconic Air Fryer review: Cleaning and maintenance

I found clean-up to be super easy. I ended up washing both the crisper plate and basket by hand, but you can also toss them in the dishwasher. The stainless steel exterior does get fingerprints on it super quickly, and it streaks if you wash it with a paper towel and some spray. But if you’ve got a microfiber cloth handy, you can get a nice, streak-free, and fingerprint-free finish.

So far, my only complaint with the Iconic is the relatively short power cord. It would help if this were longer to make it easier to place it in various locations in my kitchen.

Cosori Iconic Air Fryer review: App

You can control the Iconic using Cosori’s VeSync app. It’s a quick and easy setup once you register your account. You’ll pair the Iconic to the app via WiFi, which only took seconds when I did it.

Once in the app, you can choose recommended settings for any number of meals, and it’s easy to cycle through the options to find what you’re looking for most of the time. The odd thing is, you can’t start the Iconic remotely, even with the app. You can basically send the cooking time, temperature, and settings straight to the unit from your phone, but in order to start the Iconic, you will need to physically walk over to it. That’s likely a safety feature, but no less annoying because of it.

The app also has other nifty features. You can monitor the cooking progress of your food and activate voice control, too. There are other resources in the app so you can learn more about how to cook, what to cook, and what you’ll need to prep certain meals. Overall, it’s a well-thought-out app, if not a little cluttered.

Cosori Iconic Air Fryer review: Accessories

Cosori sells plenty of accessories specific to air fryers, and others that are more multi-purpose. The Air Fryer Accessories bundle ($32) includes a cake pan, pizza pan, silicone mat, metal holder, egg bites mold, and a rack with 4 skewers. This will likely cover most of the cooking you’ll do with the Iconic.

You can also get a Smart Meat Thermometer which I would highly recommend, so you can monitor your food’s internal temperature without opening the basket. Other nifty accessories include a food dehydrator, fruit roll sheets ($20), Cosori Air Fryer Liners ($12), and a Cosori NutriLens Smart Nutrition Scale ($50).

Cosori Iconic Air Fryer review: Verdict

Overall, I really don’t have anything negative to say about the Cosori Iconic. It’s been a fantastic addition to my kitchen, and it makes my life much simpler come dinner time. It cooks quickly, efficiently, and with an ease that makes me actually want to cook.

While its small size might be limiting if you’re cooking for a lot of people, I’ve found it’s an ideal size for my family of three.

Granted, there is a learning curve to it, even if you’ve owned an air fryer before. Perhaps it’s because of the DC motor, which is quicker and more efficient than AC motors, but the cooking times seem to be shorter than what’s often recommended. So, as you learn the particular features of the Iconic, be sure to keep an eye on the food within.