How to make perfectly crispy frozen chicken tenders in air fryer! Way better than in the oven, this is how to make them taste like they’re from a restaurant
Frozen chicken tenders in air fryer are seriously the best! NO more need for the oven anymore because crisping them in this way is way better. Best kitchen hack right here. Find this and more easy air fryer recipes here on The Typical Mom blog. (affiliate links present)
I wasn’t convinced cooking frozen food in an air fryer was better, but it is a game changer y’all!
We started with air fryer chicken nuggets and I couldn’t believe the difference. A quick cook time plus how crunchy the outsides got. I even ate them for lunch that day!
I figured out how long to cook frozen chicken tenders in air fryer by looking at my handy dandy chart!!
- You too can print this air fryer cook times out and keep it on your fridge.
- Then next time you want to know how long air fryer fish sticks take, or chicken, you’ll know!
- Of course you should BOOKMARK my website because I share new tips and dinner recipes like this regularly too. 😉
Now it really doesn’t matter what brand you buy, but I show a picture of the variety we choose. There will likely be larger and smaller frozen chicken strips inside all packages. Depending on the size, the smaller one will get crispier and thicker pieces won’t get quite as hot.
If you follow the directions below you’ll notice that we leave them inside the air fryer basket for 5 minutes after the cook time is up. This is important to ensure the middle gets warm all the way.
This is all you need to make frozen air fryer chicken tenders
- A bag of breaded chicken strips
- find them in the freezer section of grocery stores
- Any brand of air fryer
That is it my friends!! NO non stick spray or olive oil spray is necessary, they’ll get crunchy all by themselves with the circulating hot air. I used my Ninja Foodi Grill to make these, and then threw in some air fryer vegetables once they were done.
- They’re great with some air fryer onion rings too though.
Complete meal. Done!! If you have one of these too you can find more Ninja air fryer recipes here, but any brand will work.
I prefer the chicken breast strips variety to air fry. These cost just a bit more, using boneless skinless chicken to make into tenders but so worth it.
Here’s what you do to make air fried chicken in just 15 minutes
- Preheat your air fryer to 400 degrees for 5 minutes.
- Place as many pieces as you want to eat in one layer inside your basket.
- Set cook time to 8 minutes, no need to wait ___ minutes flipping them over, they’ll crisp just fine without it.
- Let them sit in the basket for an additional 5 minutes after the time is up to continue heating the inside of each piece.
- Enjoy your fried chicken strips with dipping sauces!
Want to try other versions of fried chicken tenders?
- If you want to make a low carb version, try our air fryer chicken tenders no breading recipe.
- These homemade breaded chicken tenders are great wrapped with bacon. They take 12 minutes to 14 minutes to cook with bread crumbs.
- Then try crispy chicken legs in air fryer and air fryer corn dogs next, your kids will love these too.
Of course you can use ketchup, but our favorite chicken strip dipping sauce is our homemade fry sauce!
Printable recipe below with nutritional information listed. Be sure to sign up for our free newsletter to get more easy air fryer recipes, and others, delivered to your email weekly.
Frozen Chicken Tenders in Air Fryer
Ingredients
- 1 bag frozen chicken strips
Instructions
- Preheat air fryer to 400 degrees.
- Lay frozen tenders in one layer, not overlapping, in basket and cook for 8 minutes. (timing will vary slightly depending on how large and thick your pieces are)
- When time is up leave them in the closed basket for 5 minutes so the middle can continue to heat up.
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