To convert a fan oven recipe to an air fryer, reduce the temperature by 10°C and reduce the cooking time by 20%. A fan oven recipe at 200°C for 30 minutes becomes 190°C for 24 minutes in the air fryer.
Enter your recipe settings to get the converted values
Recipe Details
Converted Settings
Cooking Tips
Why These Settings?
Fan Oven to Air Fryer Chart
| Fan oven | Air fryer | Conventional equivalent | Gas mark |
|---|---|---|---|
| 120°C | 110°C | 140°C | 1 |
| 130°C | 120°C | 150°C | 2 |
| 150°C | 140°C | 170°C | 3 |
| 160°C | 150°C | 180°C | 4 |
| 170°C | 160°C | 190°C | 5 |
| 180°C | 170°C | 200°C | 6 |
| 200°C | 190°C | 220°C | 7 |
| 210°C | 200°C | 230°C | 8 |
Time: multiply by 0.8 in every case. 20 minutes becomes 16, 35 becomes 28, 50 becomes 40.
A fan oven and an air fryer are the same category of appliance. Both use a heating element with a fan driving air across the food, which strips away the insulating layer of cooler air that would otherwise cling to the surface. The air fryer differs only in fan speed, which is roughly two to three times higher, and cavity volume, which is a fraction of an oven's. Those two differences are worth about 10°C and 20% of the time.
Why is this reduction smaller than the conventional oven one?
Because a fan oven temperature has already been reduced. British recipes give fan figures that sit 20°C below the conventional equivalent, so the correction for forced air is baked into the number you are reading. Only the residual difference — fan speed and cavity size — remains, and that is the 10°C.
What happens if I subtract 20°C instead?
The food undercooks, and usually unevenly: pale, slightly damp, and firm in the centre. This is the most common fan oven conversion error, and it comes from applying the conventional-oven rule to a fan figure. If your first conversion came out like that, add 10°C back and keep the time reduction.
Is my oven a fan oven?
If the dial or display has a fan symbol, or the manual describes a "fan assisted" or "fan forced" mode, yes. Most ovens sold in the UK, Ireland, Australia and continental Europe since the 1990s are fan ovens. Some have both modes — check which one is actually selected, because the recipe's assumption and your setting need to match.
Does the recipe tell me which temperature it means?
Well-written British recipes give both, in the form "200°C / 180°C fan / gas mark 6". If only one figure appears and it is not labelled, assume conventional if a gas mark is given alongside it, and fan if the recipe is recent and gives no gas mark.
Does an air fryer oven convert differently to a basket?
The temperature conversion is identical. The difference is capacity: an air fryer oven holds roughly what a fan oven shelf holds, so quantities that would need two basket batches often fit in one. Basket models under 5 litres will usually need splitting.
Related conversions and adjacent topics
Fan ovens and conventional ovens take different reductions, because a fan figure has already been adjusted once. The fan oven conversion covers that distinction, which is the most common source of undercooked results in UK kitchens.
The UK oven to air fryer converter works in Celsius throughout and defaults to fan oven, so no cross-system rounding is involved.
Frequently asked questions
What is 180°C fan in an air fryer?
170°C, with time reduced by 20%. A 25-minute fan bake becomes 20 minutes.
What is 200°C fan in an air fryer?
190°C, time reduced by 20%. This is the most common roasting and chip temperature in UK recipes.
Can I just use the same temperature as the fan oven?
For short cooks under 15 minutes, often yes — the difference has little time to show. For anything longer, the 10°C reduction prevents the exterior running ahead of the centre.
Does the conversion work in reverse?
Yes: add 10°C and multiply the time by 1.25 to go from air fryer to fan oven.
What if my air fryer only shows Fahrenheit?
Convert your fan temperature to Fahrenheit first, then treat it as a convection figure and subtract 10°F (-10°C). Do not subtract 25°F (-5°C) — that is the conventional oven rule.