An Expert's Review of the Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro After 4 Years of Testing

Countertop real estate is a hot commodity in most kitchens, so any appliance that claims it can do double duty has my attention. Throughout my career as a food editor, I have come across many of these appliances, but few are as ambitious as the Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro.

The Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro touts 13(!) different cooking functions — from toasting and reheating to air frying and dehydrating. This countertop oven can cook frozen pizza, heat up leftovers, toast bagels, air fry crispy chicken strips and even bake a batch of brownies. But does it deserve a spot on my kitchen counter — and yours?

Breville Smart Oven Pro Toaster Oven

$400 at Amazon

$396 at Walmart$400 at breville.com

Pros

• Offers 13 cooking functions, including a keep warm function
• Heats quickly and performed well in Lab and consumer testing
• Cooks a large volume of food at once
• Accommodates several standard baking pan sizess

Cons

• Large footprint might not suit all kitchens
• Takes longer to toast than some other ovens
• Not the strongest air fryer

Functions: Toast, Bagel, Broil, Bake, Roast, Warm, Pizza, Proof, Air Fry, Reheat, Cookies, Slow Cook and Dehydrate | Capacity: 1 cubic foot (brand claims large enough for nine slices of bread, a 14-pound turkey as well as most 9" x 13" pans and 12-cup muffin trays) | Accessories: 13-inch pizza pan; two oven racks; 9" x 13" broil rack and enamel roasting pan; mesh basket rack for dehydrating and air frying | Dimensions: 17.5" x 21.5" x 12.7"

I work in the Good Housekeeping Test Kitchen, and I have been using the Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro at home for more than four years after receiving it as a gift from my wedding registry. Even after all this time, I'm still using this appliance almost every day of the week! It has practically replaced my oven. I even moved my microwave to the basement because I basically stopped using it altogether (leftovers taste way better reheated in a toaster oven vs. nuked, don't you think?).

Suffice it to say that the Breville air fryer toaster oven has earned its place in my kitchen, so I had to check in with Nicole Papantoniou, director of the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliances and Innovation Lab, and her team to hear their thoughts, which are backed by thorough testing. Good news: They recommend it, too!

In the Lab, Papantoniou and her team of product analysts evaluate all types of kitchen appliances, including air fryers, toaster ovens and air fryer toaster ovens, to find the best ones. Over the past few years, these appliance experts have put over 40 air fryers, 40 toaster ovens and 20 air fryer toaster ovens to the test — including the Breville Smart Oven Pro, the Breville Joule Oven Air Fryer Pro and the Breville Compact Smart Oven.

The Good Housekeeping Kitchen Appliances Lab has evaluated a few different kitchen appliances from Breville — including Breville espresso machines — and the brand has earned top spots in our roundups of the best toaster ovens, best air fryer toaster ovens and best indoor pizza ovens.

In our Lab and consumer tests, we evaluate overall performance and ease of use. We review user manuals and instruction guides and rank how intuitive the appliance is. Breville had high scores across the board, and consumers agreed it worked as it claimed it would. It was easy to set up and included easy-to-read instructions.

For anyone who skips reading instruction manuals (oh, hi!), you're in luck. The interface is super straightforward, and I found the oven easy to operate without any directions. You turn a knob to toggle between cooking functions, which are clearly displayed on a digital screen. Another knob allows you to control how many slices of toast you have, select the temperature setting or set your timer. "The directions displayed on the screen were simple to follow and easy to read," says Product Analyst Raena Loper, who has tested over a dozen air fryer toaster ovens in the last year

There's even a button you can press if you're starting with something frozen (i.e., waffles). One Lab expert commented that the menus were simple to follow and ideal for people who appreciate more cooking assistance.

The oven door has markings to show you the ideal rack height for the different cooking methods, so there's no guessing where to place the air fryer basket (as opposed to the oven rack) for an optimal cooking experience.

The Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro offers more than a dozen cooking functions, which is great for anyone who wants the flexibility of using the same appliance to roast a chicken, toast bread, air fry wings, dehydrate apple slices and bake a batch of cookies. The Lab experts commented on its versatility, especially compared to other brands and models.

Toasting

To test how evenly toaster ovens heat, the experts in the Kitchen Appliances Lab place slices of white bread side-by-side on one of the racks and measure how quickly and evenly they toast at various settings. Breville products received lower scores for toasting than some other toaster ovens. Toasting took about a minute longer, and the slices of bread weren't the most evenly browned. In my personal testing (read: toasting up a bagel or slice of bread for breakfast), I noticed the variations in darkness, but it hasn't been much of an issue. One consumer tester commented, "My whole family relies on the oven for toasting bread and frozen bagels in the morning, then sandwiches and pita bread for lunch. The toaster does the job well for non-serious toast enthusiasts like us, but it may not be the most impressive component, as sometimes it takes two attempts to achieve extra crispiness and make it just right."

Roasting and baking

The roasting and baking functions, however, earned high scores in our Lab testing. We roasted a 4-pound chicken and were pleased with the results: juicy, with crispy skin. "The Breville produced crisp food with a nice golden color without being dry," says Loper.

We used the included pizza pan and pizza function to cook a frozen pizza and were impressed with the golden crust and evenly browned cheese. Our cake-baking test produced pleasant results, as well.

At home, I typically use this appliance instead of my oven. Most days I'm cooking for two and this countertop oven heats up more quickly than my full-size oven and doesn't make my whole kitchen hot (win-win). Plus, I love throwing one or two cookies in and using the bake function for a sweet post-dinner treat.

One consumer tester raved about this appliance after two years of testing, saying "It's probably one of my favorite things I own. I honestly use it more than I use my actual oven. It's just so easy and takes like two seconds to heat up."

Air frying

Compared with other air fryer models, including air fryer toaster ovens and especially basket-style air fryers, we found that others scored higher during Lab testing. The Breville air fryer toaster ovens didn't make wings and frozen fries as crispy as others. I find that the appliance gets smoky if I air fry anything oily or greasy — like marinated foods or chicken wings.

Smoking and steam were also flagged by our Lab and our consumer testers. Papantoniou points out that this air fryer toaster oven doesn't have a tray under the air fryer basket, so oil and fat drip onto the exposed heat source on the bottom. I air-fried bacon once and immediately regretted it.

While I will use the Breville air fryer function to make crispy air fryer tofu and have found success with recipes that call for air frying something in a ramekin, like peanut butter molten chocolate cakes, I prefer my basket-style air fryer for most air-frying tasks. It is more convenient since I don't need to find a potholder to shake the food halfway through and can easily pop the basket into the dishwasher afterward. Cleaning the included Breville wired basket can be challenging since hand-washing is recommended, and fibers from the sponge often get caught in the basket's holes during scrubbing.

Reheating and warming

These functions set an air fryer toaster oven apart from any mono-task appliance (read: toaster, basket-style air fryer). As I mentioned, I moved my microwave out of the kitchen because I stopped using it and instead reheated my food in the Breville. Another consumer tester agreed, "We use it daily to reheat food and prefer it over a microwave. My daughter loves reheating mashed potatoes and pasta; she prefers the taste and texture and doesn't mind that it takes a bit longer."

The warm function allows you to keep foods at a certain temperature for a specific duration of time. "I really appreciate the warm feature on the oven since I often don't manage to have all my dishes ready at the same time; I find it indispensable now," says one consumer tester.

Measuring 17.5 inches by 21.5 inches by 12.7 inches, the Breville Smart Oven Pro is definitely larger than other air fryer toaster ovens out there. This introduces its own pros and cons: If you don't have a ton of space, the size may very well be a deal breaker.

If you do have the space, though, its size offers a few benefits:

• Its large capacity means that you can cook a decent amount of food at once — our Lab experts were able to fit up to nine slices of toast! This provides a good option for larger families or someone who likes batch cooking.
• I found that the larger size makes this appliance an even better alternative to a conventional oven. Most quarter sheet pans will fit, as well as many cake pans and square baking pans, so you don't have to buy anything special (a huge perk, in my opinion!).

In our Lab tests, we found that cleaning the included air fryer basket was tricky, but many of the included trays cleaned easily. I noticed that it is pretty hard to clean when anything drips onto the heating elements (especially during air frying). Otherwise, the crumb tray is easy to remove, scrub in the sink and replace. And wiping the appliance with a wet cloth was simple.

Close-up of the heating elements. 

Example of a hard-to-clean air fryer basket.

In the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliances and Innovation Lab, the experts perform tests to determine how well an air fry toaster oven can air fry, bake, broil and toast.

To rate each model, we:

• cook chicken wings to see how quickly and evenly they crisp up
• toast dozens of slices of bread at different settings to evaluate the evenness of browning and timing
• air fry frozen French fries to assess goldenness, crispness and moistness
• make frozen pizza to see how evenly the cheese melts and whether the crust is done
• bake a cake to see how evenly it cooks
• broil steak to gauge the strength and efficacy of the broiling function

Over the past four years, I have used the Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro in my home kitchen an estimated five times per week (often more!). I have toasted hundreds of slices of bread, as well as dozens of bagels and frozen waffles. I experimented with a variety of air fryer recipes ranging from meatloaf, fish and tofu to air fryer eggplant Parmesan, crispy chickpeas and fajitas.

I have also broiled open-faced cheese sandwiches, roasted black beans, baked chocolate chip cookies, dehydrated apple slices and reheated countless leftovers (sesame chicken, grain bowls, slices of pizza, you name it).

Consumer testers have had the opportunity to use the Breville Joule Oven Air Fryer Pro for over eight months and provided us with feedback. This model shares many characteristics with the Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro but also offers a connected experience and allows you to sync with an app.

In the 12 months since this article was first published, I have continued to use (and love!) my Breville at home. While other appliances tend to lose their novelty over time, this one continues to prove its value. Despite frequent daily use, I still haven't needed to replace any parts and haven't noticed any change in the appliance quality. That said, it definitely isn't as clean as it once was — partly because I'm lazy with cleaning after each use and partly because of the aforementioned issues. I do not have any plans to replace this toaster oven any time soon.

I checked in with our consumer testers, too. One said, "I use it all the time! I love all the different settings you can adjust depending on what you're cooking, especially the keep warm feature. I'll throw takeout in there to stay warm if I need to hop in the shower or handle some chores before dinner, and not have to worry about the food getting cold." Another consumer tester said they continue to use theirs nearly every day.

If you have the counter space and are looking for a toaster oven that can handle a variety of culinary tasks beyond simply toasting bread, we say yes. One consumer tester said, "I would buy this all day long!" Another said, "It is the best kitchen product I have, by far!" If space is an issue, we recommend opting for a smaller model. Breville recently released a compact version, which measures 17 inches by 15.75 inches by 10 inches and offers air fry, toast, bagel, pizza, broil and bake/roast functions, the Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Compact. We have been using this model in the Good Housekeeping Test Kitchen for over a month and are impressed so far.

Looking for something more high-tech? The Breville Joule Oven Air Fryer Pro offers a more connected experience, allowing you to sync the appliance with an app, and it performed well in our Lab tests. Consumer testers noted that the smart features were easy to set up and use. One tester reported that the app enhanced her overall cooking experience. "I prefer operating it through the app," she says.

For anyone who prioritizes air frying and either already owns a standard toaster or doesn't frequently toast, bake or roast, we suggest opting for a basket-style air fryer, like the Ninja Air Fryer Max XL, which produced crispy and evenly-cooked chicken wings in our Lab tests and proved easy to clean.

Trish Clasen Marsanico is the deputy food editor at Good Housekeeping. She works closely with the recipe developers and testers in the Good Housekeeping Test Kitchen. She has over a decade of experience producing food content for magazines, websites, cooking apps and cookbooks — including Good Housekeeping's Air Fryer Magic cookbook.

Nicole Papantoniou is the director of the Kitchen Appliances Lab, where she has overseen all testing and content related to cooking products, including toaster ovens and air fryers, for more than five years. She has worked in test kitchens for small kitchen appliance brands and has answered many readers' questions about air frying over the years (e.g. how does an air fryer actually work?).

Trish Clasen Marsanico

Deputy Food Editor

Trish (she/her) is the deputy food editor at Good Housekeeping, where she covers all things food, from cooking trends and delicious recipes to top-tested kitchen products and grocery finds. She has more than a decade of experience writing about food for GH, Women’s Health, Prevention, Redbook, Woman’s Day, The Daily Meal and Food Network. When she’s not at the supermarket or trying out a new recipe, you can find her at the beach, in her backyard or on the couch — typically with a glass of wine in hand.

Reviewed byNicole Papantoniou

Kitchen Appliances Lab Director

Nicole (she/her) is the director of the Good Housekeeping Institute's Kitchen Appliances and Innovation Lab, where she has overseen content and testing related to kitchen and cooking appliances, tools and gear since 2019. She’s an experienced product tester and recipe creator, trained in classic culinary arts and culinary nutrition. She has worked in test kitchens for small kitchen appliance brands and national magazines, including Family Circle and Ladies’ Home Journal.