I cooked a whole chicken in the Breville Halo Flexi air fryer and it was perfection

As Food Editor at GoodtoKnow, I have tested an abundance of air fryers over the years and most have impressed me, however, none have won me over like the Breville Halo Flexi air fryer. This one has set the bar high… and I mean high.

If you’re looking for a multifunctional air fryer that takes air frying to a whole new level, I give you the Breville Halo Flexi air fryer - one of the best family air fryers currently on the market. A smart, easy-to-use machine that features a variety of air fry cooking presets alongside the ability to roast, grill, bake, and reheat food. It’s a game changer that's for sure, and I haven’t even mentioned the removable divider for cooking larger foods, as well as the baking trays and mesh trays which are included, the handy draw at the bottom of the machine and the ‘French door’ style cooking compartments either. It’s a good’un. 

The Breville Halo Flexi air fryer made family cooking a breeze for me during testing as it has a whopping 11-litre capacity, which certainly came in handy when cooking a whole roast chicken. A little more complex than some of the other air fryers I’ve tested, as it features so much more and includes so many more accessories, it's worth spending some time diving into the tips and advice featured in the instruction booklet before you get started - so don’t unbox just before dinner time otherwise you’ll have a riot on your hands. 

If you’re looking to jump on the air fryer bandwagon or you want to upgrade your current model, here’s everything you need to know about the Breville Halo Flexi air fryer and why I think it is by far one of the best family air fryers out there.

Jessica Dady

For this review, GoodtoKnow turned to our Food Editor to put this popular kitchen appliance to the test in a busy family household. The result? This model took air frying to a whole new level. 

Price & availability

At the time of writing the Breville Halo Flexi air fryer is priced at £229.99 from various retailers including Amazon, John Lewis, and Currys. 

It’s at the higher end of the budget when compared to other 11-litre capacity dual air fryers however you’re paying for all the extras you get with this model including all the accessories, various functionalities on the machine, and the ability to transform your air fryer from dual to single just by removing a simple divider - genius. 

Design & features

Capacity: 11-litre | Dimensions: Approx. 41.2D x 40.5W x 41.2H cm | Wattage: 2400 W | Colour: Black  | Functions: Air fry, turbo crisp, roast, grill, bake & reheat | Style: Dual Basket with removable divider | Max temp: 200 degrees celsius | Dishwasher safe parts: Yes

The Breville Halo Flexi air fryer is a smart, stylish-looking machine that certainly looks the part on your kitchen counter. It is big, however, for the capacity and volume you get within the machine, I was pleasantly surprised it wasn’t extra large and didn’t take up masses of counter space. Unboxing was relatively easy as the air fryer comes in minimal packaging, the accessories, however, have quite a bit of plastic wrapped around them so you may need a pair of scissors on hand (unless you’d like to use this opportunity to release some pent-up anger). I’ve never unboxed an air fryer with so many accessories included and unwrapping one after the other was rather exciting. With the Breville Halo Flexi air fryer, you get two cooking baskets with airflow trays, two small mesh trays, two small roasting trays, one large roasting tray, and a basket handle.

Once out of the box, you can admire this modern machine in all its glory, from a touchscreen display to a sleek black top, easy access storage drawer at the bottom, and the doors… don’t even get me started on the doors. With standard dual air fryers, basket drawers open by pulling them towards you, but these doors unclip and fold down - I believe the trending term is ‘French door’ air fryers - and I love them. The baskets aren’t attached to the doors, instead, they can be fully removed from the air fryer using a basket handle which is included. Having the baskets unattached makes cleaning them a dream, plus each basket comes with an airflow tray to ensure optimal cooking each time.

After swooning over the ‘French doors’ my attention moved to the storage drawer at the bottom of the machine. I wasn’t sure what the little tab was a first but just push gently down with your finger and ta-dah, there is a secret hidden compartment underneath the machine where the two small roasting trays and the large roasting tray can be kept. Such a fantastic idea and great for keeping accessories tucked away. 

Inside the oven of the air fryer you have two separate sections; section one and section two. You can set different temperatures, times and use both sides of the machine at the same time or individually. You can also sync the drawers to finish cooking at the same time. There are grooves either side of each section wall so you can slot the small roasting trays and mesh trays into place. You can then layer your cooking, so you could have a mesh tray of chips cooking at the top of one section, you could have a roasting tray of chicken nuggets underneath that. And then in the second section, you could have a basket of vegetables, or a mesh tray and roasting tray all over again. You can literally cook four things at once if you wanted to.

Now, lets talk about that removable divider I’ve mentioned. The removable divider or partition wall as I like to call it, can be slid (well, pulled gently) out of the machine once both doors are fully open and down. Sliding the removable divider allows you to cook using the machine as a whole, so the section one and section two functionality no longer work and the machine is seen at a singular air fryer. This was revolutionary for me. I have been dreaming of cooking a whole chicken in an air fryer for as long as I can remember and I’ve had minimal success using other models (there just wasn’t enough space for the medium chicken we like to have with our Sunday roast) until the Breville Halo Flexi air fryer came into my life. Once the divider has been removed, its time to get the large roasting tray involved. I went straight in for the whole chicken, but you can cook an abundance of foods using the machine as a full 11-litre capacity air fryer. Think cakes, tray bakes, cookies, roast potatoes, roast vegetables, a whole gammon or ham joint… the list goes on.

After reading the instruction booklet a couple of times, and deciding whether to cook in baskets, trays or mesh trays, it was time to start cooking. The cable is a reasonable length so plugging the machine to the mains was a piece of cake - just remember to give the air fryer some space around the back of the machine for airflow. For cooking I tested all of the air fryer preset functions as well as the other functions to grill, bake and turbo crisp, and was rather happy with the results, particularly the air frying functionalities. The other functions I saw as an added bonus to have, but I wanted to air fry most foods as it’s much quicker, and in some cases, like when it came to making potato wedges or BBQ sticky chicken, I saw better results air frying over roasting or grilling for example. 

When it comes to setting the machine ready for cooking, if you’re dual cooking, you select the number one section, choose your preset function, or manually adjust the time and temperature with a click of a button. You can also choose to sync cooking end time so both number one and number two sections finish cooking at the same time. You then move over to choose number two and programme accordingly. The play/pause button starts cooking. You can pause anytime during cooking, or you can just open the door and the machine will automatically stop. When using the air fryer as a singular air fryer, removing the divider, the touchscreen will only display number one section which you can then programme to your needs.

The fan noise of the air fryer didn’t offend me at all and went completely unnoticed in my busy kitchen. I would say it was on par with the level of my conventional oven in terms of noise.  And the machine didn’t overheat or feel ridiculously hot to touch externally either after cooking which is good to know with my kid's inquisitive hands around.

How we tested

• Vigorously tested for a month by a busy working mum feeding two hungry school children (one of whom eats just as much as I do), a husband (who eats more than we all do put together), and a dog - who enjoyed any type of scraps she could get her paws on.
• Foods cooked in this machine included: Whole chicken, fish fingers, breaded chicken, potato wedges, frozen chips, corn on the cob, roasted veg (peppers, mushrooms, onion, carrots, sweet potato, garlic, etc.), new potatoes, chocolate chip cookies, sausages, chicken wings and drumsticks, chicken nuggets, garlic bread and more.
• The air fryer was assessed based on how easy it was to use, navigate, and set up, how well it cooked food using the pre-set functions and manual settings, what it looked like, and how big, noisy, and efficient the machine was overall.

Things you wouldn’t find on the box

With most air fryer machines, preset functions are included - these are set temperatures and times for specific foods; be it chicken, chips, fish, etc. however, don’t be afraid to go against the grain on this one and opt to manually override and choose your own time and temperatures. I found this worked for me quite a few times, especially now I’ve tested a range of different air fryers, knowing that a certain food is best cooked at a certain temperature and time, instead of going with the presets, it sometimes gave me better results. However, if you’re new to the air fryer world, the presets are a great place to start.

Another point worth mentioning is that during the cooking process, when air frying the machine beeps half way through cooking to tell you to ‘flip’ the foods. This is a great reminder when cooking chips, sausages or fish cakes, etc. certain foods that would benefit from being shook or flipped during cooking so they are crisp and golden all over. However, you don’t need to ‘flip’ everything so you can ignore the ‘flip’ beep if you want (I won’t tell if you don’t) as it's a good reminder, but not necessary for every food.

When opening and closing the doors, a light comes on. The light automatically turns off during cooking, however if you want to check on foods without opening the doors, you can click on the lightbulb icon on the touchscreen display and it will turn on for a minute or two whilst you check the foods through the door windows. The windows are yet another super handy feature which I appreciated when testing this machine, as the control freak in me likes to keep a close eye on food cooking, as burnt food is a big no-no.

Now, let's talk about cleaning. The box says that the accessories are dishwasher safe, however, washing them in a dishwasher isn’t necessary and if you’re happy to wash them in warm soapy water - go for it as it works just as well. It will probably make the trays and mesh trays last longer. After each use, I soaked the baskets, tray, and mesh trays for about half an hour or so before cleaning, and I used a non-abrasive sponge. Cleaning juices from the whole chicken, burnt honey from the sticky BBQ chicken wings I made, and cookie dough that escaped down the air-flow trays was easy peasy after light soaking. Even the splatters from sausages and garlic bread came out like a dream.

One thing worth mentioning that did bug me about this machine was the fingerprints and dust marks. Maybe it's just me, but as the model is so sleek and black and wonderful, you want to keep it pristine but that isn’t always possible (especially with kids in the house) so there was a fair amount of damp cloth wiping, probably daily. 

Who is it best for?

There are various reasons why buying an air fryer is a good investment; they’re energy-efficient, tend to cook food quicker and make a great replacement for your oven but one of the most important factors to consider when purchasing an air fryer is whether it will suit your family’s needs or not. Large families catering to different dietary requirements would probably benefit from a bigger model, however, individuals, couples, or smaller families might benefit from a single-basket fryer depending on how much you plan on using it or what you want to cook in it. 

The Breville Halo Flexi air fryer certainly ticks a box for larger families looking to cook multiple meals at once. During testing, I was cooking for a family of four daily. Occasionally we had friends over, playdates, etc. and I had no trouble increasing portion sizes or cooking different foods in the Breville Halo Flexi. It replaced my oven for the month of testing and I cooked everything from roast chicken to a tray of chocolate chip cookies, from chicken wings to frozen chips.

Need an alternative?

Suppose you love the idea of owning a Breville air fryer but this one is a little out of your price range or maybe is too big. In that case, I’d recommend the Breville Halo VDF126 air fryer - a single-basket air fryer that I’ve tried and tested recently (Breville Halo air fryer review) and is a powerhouse. It’s an older model so is much cheaper too. 

Otherwise, if your heart is set on a dual air fryer I would highly recommend the Lakeland Dual basket air fryer, which I’ve also reviewed (Lakeland Dual basket air fryer review) it is a smaller 8-litre model, however, it has plenty of room for family cooking - and is super easy to use and set up too. 

Or if you’re looking for something even bigger, our Consumer Editor Heidi, highly recommends the Proscenic T31 15-litre air fryer - perfect for larger families.

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