Whole frozen pizza in an air fryer
From frozen — the short answer
180°C (356°F) for 20 min
- For
- From frozen
- In
- Basket air fryer, single layer, pieces not touching
- Preheat
- Not needed
- Check
- The cheese has melted and browned in patches
- Safety
- Food cooked from frozen must reach the same core temperature as the same food cooked fresh — the frozen centre is the last thing to get there. Full rule below.
A fit problem before it is a cooking problem, and the answer depends on your appliance.
From frozen
Before anything else
From national food-safety authorities, not from us. These take precedence over any cooking time below.
Requirement — Food safety (microbiological)
Food cooked from frozen must reach the same core temperature as the same food cooked fresh — the frozen centre is the last thing to get there.
Target: 70°C in the thickest part.
How to tell, without a thermometer
- No ice or cold spot at the centre when the thickest piece is cut open
- Steaming hot throughout, tested in the middle rather than the edge
If it has not got there: Reduce the temperature by 10–20°C and give it longer. A lower set point lets the centre catch up before the surface passes the point of no return, and it is the single most useful adjustment for cooking from frozen.
Important: If the packaging says the product must be thawed before cooking, follow it. That instruction exists because the manufacturer has tested cooking it from frozen and it did not reach temperature reliably.
The quick answer
180°C (356°F) for 20 min
A single published preset default of twenty minutes at 180°C. No size is stated, and pizza size is the variable that decides whether this is possible at all in a 5-litre drawer.
- Assuming
- From frozen
- In
- Basket air fryer
- Loaded
- Single layer, pieces not touching
- Preheat
- Not needed
- Result
- Crisp outside, moist inside
Preparation
Straight from the freezer, on the crisper tray, cut down if it will not fit flat. No oil is added.
No oil needed.
How to load the basket
Single layer, pieces not touching. The reference condition. Air reaches every surface, and times are the shortest the food will achieve.
How to tell it is done
- The cheese has melted and browned in patches
- The base is firm enough to hold a slice out flat
Where these figures came from — from frozen
- Applies to
- Specific to this model
- Why this rating
- A preset the manufacturer programmed into the appliance and published with both its default temperature and its default time. It is the manufacturer's own starting point for that food in that machine, which is real published guidance and is weaker than a chart row because no quantity comes with it.
- Last reviewed
- 2026-08-13
What this does not cover
- Published by the manufacturer for this model. It is evidence about this appliance and is not general advice.
- NO QUANTITY IS PUBLISHED. A preset is a starting point the manufacturer chose, not a validated time for a stated weight, and it cannot be checked against the food in front of you the way a chart row can.
- Most whole frozen pizzas do not fit a 5-litre drawer. A pizza folded up the sides of a basket cooks in a curve and this figure does not describe that.
Sources (1)
Cookworks 5L Digital Air Fryer KDF-596D — Care & Instruction Manual (PDF)
Argos Limited (Cookworks) — Manufacturer manual (United Kingdom)
Relied on for: The temperature, time and quantity for whole frozen pizza.
States this directly
Passage read and verified
Retrieved 2026-08-13 from argos-support.co.uk
Retrieved from Argos's manual library for Argos product 148/6623.
Leftover (reheating)
Before anything else
From national food-safety authorities, not from us. These take precedence over any cooking time below.
Requirement — Food safety (microbiological)
Cool cooked food and get it into the fridge within one to two hours, keep the fridge between 0 and 5°C, and eat leftovers within 48 hours.
How to tell, without a thermometer
- There is no sensory test for this rule, and that is the point: food held too long at the wrong temperature does not necessarily look, smell or taste different
If it has not got there: Throw it away. This is the one rule in this catalogue where the remedy is not 'cook it longer', because cooking does not reverse it.
Important: Cooked rice is the sharpest case: Bacillus cereus toxins form at room temperature and survive reheating. Rice left out for more than an hour goes in the bin.
Requirement — Food safety (microbiological)
Reheat leftovers until steaming hot all the way through, and only reheat them once.
Target: 70°C in the thickest part, or an equivalent from the table below.
How to tell, without a thermometer
- Steam rising from the centre, not just the edges
- The middle is hot to the touch, tested after removing it from the appliance
If it has not got there: Keep going, and break dense food up or spread it out so the heat can reach the middle. If it will not heat through evenly, a microwave to get the centre hot followed by the air fryer to crisp the surface is a better tool for the job than the air fryer alone.
Important: Cooked rice and pasta left at room temperature can develop Bacillus cereus toxins that reheating does not destroy. If cooked rice has been out of the fridge for more than an hour, discard it rather than reheating it.
| Temperature | Held for | Measured at |
|---|---|---|
| 70°C | 2 min | the centre of the food |
| 75°C | 30 sec | the centre of the food |
The quick answer
160°C (320°F) for 3–6 min
Thickness of the base and how much topping is on it. A thin base is through in three minutes; a deep pan base is not.
- Assuming
- 200g in total, about 15mm at the thickest point, From the fridge
- In
- Basket air fryer
- Loaded
- Single layer, pieces not touching
- Preheat
- Not needed
- Result
- Heated through
Preparation
Cut into pieces that lie flat rather than curling up the sides of the basket. Nothing added.
How to load the basket
Single layer, pieces not touching. The reference condition. Air reaches every surface, and times are the shortest the food will achieve.
How to tell it is done
- The base is firm enough to hold a slice out flat without drooping
- The cheese has melted again and the centre is hot
Change the result
Each of these moves the outcome in a known direction, and most cost you something. The trade is stated so you can decide whether you want it.
- To be sure it is safe rather than just warm
- Go by the food and not the clock. It has to be steaming hot the whole way through, and the middle of a dense portion lags a long way behind its surface in an air fryer.
Where these figures came from — leftover (reheating)
- Applies to
- Specific to this type of appliance
- Why this rating
- Low in the published band because cheese browns and then burns quickly on a second heating. The time is AirfryerHQ's estimate.
- Last reviewed
- 2026-08-13
What this does not cover
- THE TIME ON THIS RECORD IS NOT SOURCED. Four manufacturers publish a reheating temperature and not one of them names a food, a quantity or a time for a named dish. The temperature here is theirs; the time is AirfryerHQ's estimate and has not been measured.
- Reheating is governed by the food-safety rule above rather than by this figure. Steaming hot throughout is the requirement; the time is a guide to getting there.
Sources (4)
Tower T17023 2.2 Litre Air Fryer — Safety and Instruction Manual (PDF)
RKW Ltd (Tower Housewares) — Manufacturer manual (United Kingdom)
Relied on for: That this manufacturer's published reheating instruction is 150°C for up to ten minutes, with no food named.
States this directly
Passage read and verified
Retrieved 2026-08-13 from argos-support.co.uk
Retrieved from Argos's manual library for Argos product 745/2194.
Cookworks 5L Digital Air Fryer KDF-596D — Care & Instruction Manual (PDF)
Argos Limited (Cookworks) — Manufacturer manual (United Kingdom)
Relied on for: That this manufacturer's published reheating instruction is 180°C for up to ten minutes, with no food named.
States this directly
Passage read and verified
Retrieved 2026-08-13 from argos-support.co.uk
Retrieved from Argos's manual library for Argos product 148/6623.
Cosori Dual Blaze 6.4L Smart Air Fryer CAF-P583S-KUK — User Manual (PDF)
Arovast Corporation (Cosori) — Manufacturer manual (United Kingdom)
Relied on for: That this manufacturer's Reheat function defaults to 175°C for five minutes.
States this directly
Passage read and verified
Retrieved 2026-08-13 from argos-support.co.uk
Retrieved from Argos's manual library for Argos product 818/0159.
AirfryerHQ Sprint 4 analysis of published cooking guidance across fifteen manuals
AirfryerHQ — Calculated or inferred by AirfryerHQ (United Kingdom)
Relied on for: The reading that no manufacturer publishes a reheat time for a named food, and that the time on this record is therefore AirfryerHQ's own estimate.
AirfryerHQ's interpretation of what it says
Citation checked — the document exists and is described correctly
Chilled
The quick answer
190°C (374°F) for 7 min
A single published figure of seven minutes for a 400g pizza, not a range. Size is the constraint before time is: a 400g pizza has to fit a 4.2-litre bowl, which usually means cutting it.
- Assuming
- 400g in total, 1 pieces, From the fridge
- In
- Basket air fryer
- Loaded
- Single layer, pieces not touching
- Preheat
- Not needed
- Result
- Crisp outside, moist inside
Preparation
Cut down if it will not lie flat rather than curling up the sides of the bowl. No oil is added.
No oil needed.
How to load the basket
Single layer, pieces not touching. The reference condition. Air reaches every surface, and times are the shortest the food will achieve.
How to tell it is done
- The cheese has melted and browned in patches
- The base holds a slice out flat without drooping
Where these figures came from — chilled
- Applies to
- Specific to this model
- Why this rating
- A published row with a min-max quantity band from the manufacturer's own cooking guide. No preheat appears anywhere in this appliance's air-fry table, which is notable because the same document requires fifteen minutes for its grill mode.
- Last reviewed
- 2026-08-13
What this does not cover
- Published by the manufacturer for this model. It is evidence about this appliance and is not general advice.
- THE MANUAL DOES NOT SAY WHETHER THE PIZZA IS FROZEN OR CHILLED. Seven minutes at 190°C is far too short for a frozen start — another manufacturer publishes twenty minutes for a frozen pizza — so this is recorded against the chilled state, and that inference is AirfryerHQ's rather than the manufacturer's.
Sources (1)
Tefal Easy Fry Classic EY501827 4.2L Air Fryer & Grill — Instruction Manual (PDF)
Groupe SEB (Tefal) — Manufacturer manual (United Kingdom)
Relied on for: The temperature, time and quantity for whole frozen pizza.
States this directly
Passage read and verified
Retrieved 2026-08-13 from argos-support.co.uk
Retrieved from Argos's manual library for Argos product 945/0170.
What usually goes wrong
A browned, blistered top over a base that is still doughy — or, in a drawer machine, a pizza folded up the sides of the basket that cooks in a curve. The base needs heat from below and most air fryers deliver it from above.
Running the appliance safely
These apply to every food and every air fryer, so they are here once rather than repeated under each state above. They come from Electrical Safety First, from UK product-safety notices and from the manufacturers’ own manuals.
- Plug an air fryer directly into a wall socket. Do not run one from an extension lead.
- An unusual smell, an unusual noise, or scorch marks on the plug mean stop using it and contact the manufacturer.
- Do not overfill. Food touching the heating element is a fire risk, not a cooking problem.
- White smoke from fatty food is usually normal. Black smoke means unplug it immediately.
- Do not leave an air fryer running unattended.
- Leave clear space above and around the appliance, and never cover the air intake or the outlet.
- Aim for a golden yellow colour or lighter on starchy foods such as chips and roast potatoes, rather than a darker brown.
- Buy from a reputable retailer rather than a third-party marketplace seller.
- Clean the drawer, the plate and the element after use. Accumulated grease is what smokes, and then what burns.
- Register the appliance with its manufacturer. It is how a recall reaches you.
- Do not rely on the appliance's own thermal protection. A UK recall was issued because it did not operate.
Each links to its own page, with what it means in practice, what to do if it has already happened, and the source it comes from. Every safety rule AirfryerHQ holds.
Why pizza behaves this way
A cooked base has already lost its surface moisture once and reabsorbed some from the topping in the fridge. Dry moving air drives that moisture back out and re-crisps the base, while the topping needs only to reach serving temperature. The failure mode is the cheese browning before the base has dried, which is a temperature problem rather than a time one.
Where to go from here
The pages that answer the questions this one tends to raise.
- Using a thermometer, and where to put itThe times above are for a piece that is not the one you are holding. This measures yours — and it is the single change that fixes most dry whole frozen pizza.
- How food actually gets crispyWhy patting it dry, spacing it out and a little oil are all the same instruction — so you can apply it when a page runs out.
- Cooking from frozenUsually cooler and longer than the same food fresh, and never worked out from the fresh figure.
- Reheating leftoversA different question governed by a different rule — steaming hot throughout, and only once.
- Why published timings differIf another chart says something else, this is usually why — and which one to believe.
Easily confused with
- Pizza (reheating) — A different cooking problem with a different answer.