Pork chops in an air fryer

An air fryer is a small convection oven, so pork chops cooks at 180 °C rather than 200 °C and takes 12–18 min instead of 20–30. That is roughly the usual 20 °C drop and a fifth off the time.

Side by side

The temperature that actually decides it

Times above are for planning. Whether pork chops is done is decided by the internal temperature and nothing else — appliance wattage varies by roughly a factor of two across the category, and thickness changes the time more than any setting does. A probe thermometer in the thickest part is the only reliable answer.

What goes wrong

• The safe minimum for whole-muscle pork was lowered to 63 °C with a 3-minute rest in 2011. The old 71 °C figure is why a generation of pork chops were dry.
• A little pink at 63 °C is expected and safe.
• Bone-in takes 3-4 minutes longer than boneless.

Air fryer wattage and basket size vary widely, so treat the first batch as a calibration run and write down what worked. These figures are compiled guidance, not a published standard.