Air fryers are the new must-have kitchen appliance that promises to cook your food in a healthier way. Air fryers use less oil than traditional frying methods, which means your food will be less greasy and more nutritious.
If you’re looking for an air fryer that can cook meals quickly and evenly, we recommend choosing one with at least 1200 watts of power. The larger models require more power and can accommodate multiple trays of food at once. Some models have multiple baskets so you can cook different dishes at the same time.
So let’s find out how much solar power you would need for an air fryer.
Solar Power for 1800-watt Air Fryer
Any appliance that has a heating element is a high-wattage appliance. Most air fryers in our homes can go up to 1800 Watts. This is twice as an average toaster in your home.
The amount of time it takes to cook your food also dictates the amount of power used. Air fryers have different settings for different temperatures and recommended lengths of time to cook certain foods. For meat, you’ll need to cook at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for 30 mins, for chicken you’ll need 20 mins.
To run an 1800-Watt Air fryer for an hour you’ll need two 500-watt solar panels wired in series and a 24v 300Ah LiFePO4 battery. If you are looking to make chicken tenders and or need to use the air fryer for 15 minutes over an hour you can use two 100-watt solar panels with a 100Ah LiFePo4 battery.
We show you how we get these numbers;
Air Fryer Watt-Hour Requirements
Electrical energy is measured in Watt-Hours. The amount of time you run an appliance determines how much power it uses.
To calculate Watt-Hours you multiply the Wattage of the device or appliance and multiply by the number of hours you use the device.
Watt-Hours = Watts X Hours
If you want to use an air fryer for 1 hour, you will need 1800 Wh of energy.
What Size Solar Panel for an Air Fryer
The size of the solar array is dependent on the area, altitude, and how far you are from the equator. If you are in an area that receives around 4 hours of sunlight a day you will divide the total Watt-hour requirement by this number.
1800Wh/4 = 450 Watts
So is a 450 Watt Solar Panel enough to support our air fryer? Not really as the solar battery determines everything. You will need to size up the Solar Panel again to match the battery. More on this later.
What Size battery for an Air Fryer
From the example above we’ve seen, we’ll need around 1800 Wh in order to run an air fryer for 1 hour. In order to get the size of the battery, you would need to run the air fryer you will need to get the number of amps required.
To get the number of amps the Inverter will draw from the battery in order to power the Air Fryer you divide the Watts by the voltage of the system.
For a 12v system
1800W/12v = 150 amps
For a 24V system,
1800W/24v = 75 amps
Amp-hours is 1-amp of power expended over one hour. This can tell you if a battery can work for the intended use or not.
Batteries are not designed to be depleted over a short period of time. Most solar batteries are labeled deep cycle and are intended to be used over a 20-hour period max. But with LiFePo4 batteries, it is possible to stretch these limits as they have a 1C C rating which means you can discharge the whole battery at once. This is not recommended however but a 50% discharge in one hour is possible.
So if we were to use a 24v 300Ah LiFePO4 battery bank (or more) it can support the 75 amps draw from the air fryer for one hour of use.
So will our 450 watts solar panel be enough for our 300Ah LiFePO4 Battery? While it will charge the battery as far as using the air fryer for one hour it will take some time to fully recharge the battery.
For a 300Ah LiFePO4 battery which can easily be charged with 60 amps then you can go up to 1000 watts or two 500-watt solar panels wired in series with your solar panel array and recharge the capacity depleted by the air fryer in around 1 hour and fully charge the battery in 6 hours.
Inverter for an 1800-watt air fryer
You won’t be running the air fryer directly from the battery. The power from the battery is in DC form and will need to be converted to AC in order to power your appliance. You will need an inverter that is rated higher than the appliance.
For an 1800-watt air fryer, you’ll need an inverter rating of at least 2000 watts.
How Much Solar Power for the different settings
As stated before there are different settings and times on an air fryer for different foods. From what we’ve calculated as the requirements for an hour we can estimate the power needed to run the air fryer for other periods of time.
| Food | Length in time | Watt-hour Requirements | Two Paired Solar Panels (24v) | Battery (24v) |
| 1 hr | 1800Wh | 500 Watts | 300Ah | |
| Baked Potatoes | 30 minutes | 900Wh | 250 Watts | 150Ah |
| Chicken Tenders | 15 minutes | 450Wh | 100 Watts | 100Ah |
| Brocolli | 10 minutes | 300Wh | 50 Watts | 50Ah |
Conclusion
An air fryer is a high-wattage appliance that requires a sizeable solar system to run. However, you can use a smaller system if you run it over a short period of time. Look for features designed to save energy such as auto shutoff and automatic temperature controls.
Auto shutoff allows you to set a timer so that when it reaches zero, your machine shuts down instead of staying on indefinitely until someone turns it off manually.