Ninja Air Fryer XL Review

About the Ninja XL Air Fryer

• Dimensions: 14 L x 11 W x 14.75 H inches
• Weight: 11.7 pounds
• Capacity: 5.5 quarts
• Cord Length: 2.6 feet
• Temperature Range: Up to 400°F
• Watts: 1750
• Warranty: 1 year

As its name suggests, the Ninja Air Fryer XL is a larger version of the brand’s best-selling original. While the original model has a 4-quart basket, the XL boasts a 5.5-quart capacity, designed to cook larger batches of food at once. The XL also offers an additional “Air Roast” setting that the original model doesn’t have.

This Ninja machine differs from the brand's larger multicookers—like the Speedi and the Foodi—which can perform a wider range of functionality in addition to air frying, like steaming, slow cooking, and searing.

This model sticks to the basics, with a simple gray design, air fryer basket, and bare-bones digital control panel with five settings. It features a cooking range of up to 400°F, allowing you to change the temperature in 5- or 10-degree increments, and the timer can go up to 60 minutes.

How we tested the Ninja XL Air Fryer

When testing air fryers, we use them to cook a variety of popular recipes. We started out cooking basics like frozen French fries, bacon, roasted potatoes, and roasted Brussels sprouts, before moving on to more complicated recipes like fried chicken and waffles.

We also tested out one of the recipes that comes with the air fryer, evaluating the food on its flavor, texture, doneness, and ease of cooking.

In addition to testing different recipes, we also evaluate the air fryer on its ease of use, safety, and features. We look at things like whether the basket slides in and out easily, if the appliance is easy to clean, how much space it takes up on the counter, and more.

What we like

It’s simple and straightforward to operate

Some of today’s air fryers have complicated menus with dozens of settings and an overwhelming number of buttons for operation. However, the Ninja XL keeps things simple and straightforward with just a few intuitive controls.

On the digital control panel, each of the five cooking functions has its own button. They’re each labeled clearly, making it easy to find the one you want. There are also separate sets of up/down arrows that allow you to set the unit’s timer and temperature settings.

Once you’ve got those on the right settings, simply press the start button to begin cooking. While testing this model, we never had to consult the manual to figure out how to program it, and we’re confident that most consumers would be able to get started without a learning curve.

It’s powerful and cooks food quickly

Thanks to its 1,750 watts of cooking power, the Ninja XL is able to cook recipes faster than many other air fryers, and all the food we tested came out evenly cooked and crispy.

In almost all of our tests, this air fryer finished cooking before other models, often shaving two to three minutes of cooking time off the recipe’s suggested range.

Chicken thighs were perfectly cooked after just 25 minutes, and frozen French fries were actually slightly overcooked after eight minutes. Plus, all of the food came out with delicious crispy exteriors that were nicely browned and delightfully crunchy.

The brand’s original recipes are delicious

Whenever an air fryer comes with its own booklet of recipes, we include one or two in our testing to evaluate how they taste.

For this unit, we made the brand’s French toast sticks. The recipe is slightly different from typical French toast recipes, calling for coconut milk and brown sugar in the egg mixture, and it came out tasting absolutely delicious.

We made the breakfast recipe using sourdough bread, and we let it soak in the egg mixture for several minutes, flipping the sticks halfway through. We were able to fit around six sticks in the air fryer’s basket at a time.

After around eight minutes of cooking them at 390°F, they were perfectly browned on the outside. The French toast had a great texture and flavor, and it’s a recipe that we’d definitely make again.

What we don’t like

It lacks some standard features

Despite its fairly high price point, the Ninja XL is bare-bones in terms of its features. The control panel allows you to select between its five cooking modes—Air Fry, Air Roast, Bake, Dehydrate, and Reheat—and adjust the cooking time and temperature. That’s it.

As mentioned above, some people may like this straightforward design, but some standard features are missing. For example, the fan doesn’t automatically stop if you pull out the cooking basket, there’s no preheat setting, and there’s no mid-cycle “shake” alarm option, either.

These features are standard on most air fryers these days (even inexpensive ones), so it seems strange that they weren’t included on this higher-end model.

It’s not much larger than the standard version

We’ve also tested the smaller, 4-quart Ninja Air Fryer (and I've personally owned it for several years). When we compared the two models, the XL doesn’t seem much bigger. If anything, its cooking basket is deeper, but that isn’t actually beneficial for most recipes.

Most air fryer recipes require you to cook ingredients in a single layer. So in order to accommodate larger batches of food, the basket needs to be wider. As a result, we don’t think the XL can hold much more than the standard version.

Should you buy the Ninja Air Fryer XL?

It works well, but doesn’t offer much value over the standard version.

After thorough testing, we don’t have any complaints about the performance of the Ninja Air Fryer XL. It’s a powerful unit that can handle any recipe, and it consistently delivers well-cooked meals with crispy, evenly browned results. Plus, its basic controls make it an easy-to-use option, even for those who are less tech-savvy.

Despite its solid performance, though, we don’t necessarily recommend this air fryer. Instead, we think most people would be fine opting for the brand’s standard model.

The Ninja Air Fryer XL is marketed as a larger version of the Ninja Air Fryer, but in practice, it doesn’t hold much additional food. It does offer the additional Air Roast feature, which could be a selling point for some. But overall, you may be better off saving yourself some money (and counter space) by sticking with the smaller version, which offers similar features at a lower price point.