Ultra Crispy Air Fryer Bacon

Air fryer bacon is ULTRA crispy and so easy to cook. No more bacon splatter all over your stove top makes it even easier to clean up after!

The air fryer is my favorite way to cook crispy chicken wings, and crispy chicken thighs, so why not use it to cook crispy bacon?

While I love baking bacon in the oven, the air fryer is perfect if you don't want to heat up the house. Perfectly crispy, and ready in 12 minutes, it's hands off and simple to cook.

Enjoy your bacon as is, or use it in a cobb salad or in bacon pancakes!

Recipe video

Watch the video below to see exactly how I cooked my bacon. It’s so easy! You can find more of my recipe videos on my YouTube channel.

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Twist the bacon to fit

Depending on the size of your air fryer model, you may be able to fit whole slices of bacon all the way across, or not. For my smaller air fryer model, I twisted the bacon ever so slightly to get it to fit properly into the air fryer basket.

It's fine to have a bit of overlap with the bacon slices, but you don't want too much or your bacon won't cook through evenly and get crispy.

Cook on a lower heat

While testing this recipe, I tried several different temperatures: 300°F, 350°F, 365°F and 400°F. The best results came at 350°F/175°C, where the bacon cooked through evenly, and the grease did not smoke excessively. At higher temperatures, the bacon was more prone to cooking unevenly, and the grease smoked out my kitchen.

Prevent smoking

The issue with cooking greasy foods in the air fryer is that the grease drips through the basket and can smoke. For this air fryer bacon, I recommend cooking at 350°F, which helps a LOT with the smoking issue.

I also recommend breaking up 1-2 pieces of bread and arranging in the bottom of the air fryer. The bread absorbs grease as it drips down and really helps reduce the smoking. Make sure you do not place the bread right agains the basket as this will prevent air flow and your bacon will not cook properly. Breaking into pieces helps disperse the bread and still allows air flow.

While the lower temperature and bread do help with smoking, there still is some that occurs. I recommend placing your air fryer near an open window or under your range hood fan.

Cooking bacon in the air fryer

1. Heat air fryer to 350°F or 175°C.
2. Place pieces of bread in the bottom of the air fryer, under the basket.
3. Arrange bacon in the basket.
4. Cook for 6 minutes, flip the bacon.
5. Cook for 6 or so more minutes, until crispy and cooked through.

Turkey bacon

I also tested this method for turkey bacon and it works great! Here are some tips for cooking turkey bacon in the air fryer

• since it's leaner, you won't need the bread slices as the air fryer does not smoke
• turkey bacon seems to cook through quicker, so I recommend reducing the cook time to 10 minutes total
• while it's tempting to cut the bacon to fit, it flew around the air fryer and didn't cook well at all, so I recommend leaving the pieces whole
• note that turkey bacon is much leaner and does not get as satisfyingly crisp as regular bacon. It is slightly crispy and also a bit chewy.

Recipe tips

• while it's OK to have a small amount of overlap in your bacon slices, you don't want complete overlap; this prevents bacon from cooking through evenly
• when cooking batches, dump out grease from the bottom of your air fryer between each batch
• store cooked bacon in an air tight container in the fridge for up to 4 days
  • reheat in the air fryer at 350°F for 3-4 minutes, until warmed through

More air fryer recipes

• Air Fryer Salmon
• Crispy Air Fryer Chicken Wings
• Ultra Crispy Air Fryer Tofu
• Crispy Air Fryer Chicken Thighs
• Air Fryer Chicken Breast
• Honey Lime Air Fryer Shrimp