Tips for making frozen wings in the air fryer
It’s really very easy, but we do have a few tips to make this recipe fail-proof.
- The cook time in this recipe assumes that your wings are completely frozen, so just toss them in straight from the freezer.
- Don’t crowd or stack the wings in the basket. You want a little bit of space between each wing for the air to circulate.
- Wait to season the wings until the end and a little cooking oil spray helps the seasonings to stick.
Air fryer tips
Note that all air fryers cook a little differently and not all chicken wings are the same size. When testing this recipe, I realized you will need to watch your wings carefully at the end of the recommended cooking time. Cook a little less time for smaller wings, a little more time for larger wings.
I also highly recommend using a instant read meat thermometer to ensure the wing internal temperature is at least 165° Fahrenheit. This is especially helpful when cooking wings from frozen, as I found when testing that they can appear cooked on the outside but are not cooked enough on the inside.
Two more crispy air fryer favorites: buffalo chicken thighs and air fryer chicken drumsticks.
Don’t skip the easy buffalo chicken wing dip
We added a simple, 3-ingredient creamy buffalo sauce to this recipe that’s a must try if you’re a buffalo chicken wing lover! It has all the classic buffalo sauce flavor from Frank’s Red Hot paired with some mayo and nutritional yeast to make it thick and creamy. It’s finger-licking good!
Looking for another sauce option for these wings? Try this Sticky, Buttery Homemade Hot Honey Sauce!
We hope you love this recipe as much as we do!
Don’t forget to leave a quick star rating and review below, we read every comment and truly appreciate your feedback. Also, be sure to browse the rest of our easy air fryer recipes to find some other favorites too!
Buffalo Air Fryer Frozen Chicken Wings (No Thaw)
Ingredients
- 1.5 lbs (680.39 g) frozen chicken wings
- Avocado oil cooking spray
- Sea salt and pepper
For the creamy buffalo sauce:
- 1 tbsp (1 tbsp) nutritional yeast
- 3 tbsp (3 tbsp) hot sauce, (we like Frank's Red Hot)
- 3 tbsp (3 tbsp) mayo
Equipment
Instructions
- Preheat air fryer (if yours preheats) to 400° Fahrenheit and set it to cook for 30 minutes. Note that you'll flip the wings at 10 minutes and may remove them before the 30 minutes are up. Follow the instructions below.
- Place frozen chicken wings in the air fryer basket so they are in an even layer and not overlapping.
- Cook for 10 minutes before flipping.
- While the wings are cooking, combine all of the sauce ingredients in a bowl or jar and then place in the fridge until it's time to serve.
- At the end of the 10 minutes of cooking, open air fryer and flip wings. Cook for another 10 minutes.
- After a total of 20 minutes of cooking, open the air fryer again and spray wings with avocado oil cooking spray and season with salt and pepper. Flip and spray with more avocado oil and season the other side with salt and pepper.
- Continue to cook at 400° for another 5-10 minutes or until they reach your desired crispiness.
- Serve with creamy buffalo sauce (either on the side for dipping or toss the wings in the sauce).
Notes
After 23 minutes in the air fryer at 400 degrees my wings were black as charcoal. Every other website says 15 minutes. Do not cook for 35 minutes.
Hi there, sorry to hear that your wings didn’t turn out. This recipe is for frozen wings, is that what you used? We make these all the time and cook wings from frozen for 25-30 minutes and they turn out great.
The air fryer you have linked in this, would this be the one you recommend? We don’t own one and looking to invest in one. These wings look delicious, my current recipe takes me over an hour to make.
Yes, we like the Instant brand Vortex air fryer. We obviously haven’t tried them all but we did have the Ninja Foodie before and prefer the Vortex. It’s a good price, has a large basket and cooks well.
These are delicious and easy!
We agree Randi, thanks for coming back to leave a rating!
Made these last night. My husband and I both agreed that this is by far the best way to cook wings! We have done a few rounds of whole 30 and wings are one of our go to dinners. We have always made them in the oven but recently got an air fryer…I also always forget to thaw meat ahead of time. This is a perfect recipe for the nights that I have nothing thawed out! SOOO tasty!
We’ve been making these once a week lately! So glad you guys enjoyed the recipe and I agree that this is the best way to cook wings 🙂