How to Air Fry Italian Sausage

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Making Italian Sausage in the Air Fryer is a quick and easy way to cook sausage without heating up the whole house or dirtying a bunch of pots and pans. Sausages come out perfectly cooked and juicy – ready to add to a pasta dish, peppers & onions, pizza, or a salad.

I love to cook Italian Sausage in the oven – it always comes out perfectly cooked – juicy on the inside and a little crispy on the outside. But sometimes, I just don’t want to heat up the whole house by turning on the oven. It’s so easy to make juicy sausage in the air fryer, and you end up with extra crispy skin.

Air fried Italian sausage cut different ways on a white plate.

This easy recipe is great because there is no prep time! You can cook up a bunch of sausage in just minutes and have a low carb dinner ready in no time!

Here’s What You Need to Make It
Instructions
Recipe Tips
What to Serve with It
How Do You Store Leftovers?
🙋‍♀️ Frequently Asked Questions
How to Air Fry Italian Sausage Recipe

Here’s What You Need to Make It

The ingredients in air fryer Italian sausage and peppers laid out and labeled.

Uncooked Italian Sausage – This recipe is for Italian Sausage, but you can use any regular-sized – link sausage for this recipe. (Do not follow these directions for small breakfast sausage links.)
- We like to use the Costco “Sweet” or Mild Italian Sausage. You can follow the same instructions for Hot Italian Sausage.
Optionally, you can add sliced Peppers & Onions to the Uncooked Sausages – I like to toss them in olive oil and add them in about halfway through the cooking time.
An Instant Read Thermometer or a Digital Meat Thermometer

Instructions

Preheat the Air Fryer to 360°F. (If your air-fryer does not have a preheat function built into its cooking time, try to preheat for about 3 minutes.)
Set the Air Fryer to cook at 360°F for 10-12 minutes, with the turn alarm on if your air fryer has one. (Otherwise, set an alarm on your phone for five and a half minutes.)
Arrange the sausages in a single layer in the basket of the air fryer, spacing them about an inch apart so that heat can circulate around them. Do NOT poke holes in the sausages, or all the juices will leak out.
Air Fry for 5 and half minutes and then flip the sausages over and cook for another 5 and a half minutes until the internal temperature of the sausages is 160°F.
Let the sausages rest & cool for about 5 minutes, then slice them up and enjoy!

A collage of images showing how to air fry Italian sausage, steps 1-5.

*Thicker sausages might take a little longer to cook.

I’ve found that in my air fryer oven, I don’t need to turn the sausages, but in my basket-style air fryer, the sausages do need to be flipped.

A pair of tongs holding an air fried Italian sausage over a white plate.

Recipe Tips

Do NOT poke holes in the sausages – the casing keeps the juices inside, and poking holes will make it all leak out.
Be sure to let your sausages rest for 5 minutes before slicing them, or all the juices will leak out.
Make sure your air fryer is clean before cooking sausage – anything that is in the air fryer can burn and change the flavor of the sausages. If you use a toaster oven-style air fryer, juices can leak out of the sausage and burn on the heating element, so be aware of that.
Cook extra sausages so that you can have leftovers for lunch the next day!
You can freeze cooked sausages once cooled to use at another time. I like to slice Italian sausage and freeze it to throw into spaghetti sauce as it is heating up for an easy weeknight dinner.
Add a slice of bread under the tray in the bottom of the basket in your air fryer to absorb excess grease and prevent smoking.

Air fried Italian sausages cut in different ways on a white plate with a pink napkin.

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What to Serve with It

Air Fryer Peppers and Onions
Italian/Antipasto Pasta Salad
Toss Cooked Sausage in Pasta with Homemade Spaghetti Sauce
Top your favorite Pizza Recipes with Italian Sausage
Potato Salad

Or, one of our personal favorite uses of these sausages is to cook them in the air fryer until halfway through the cooking time, then add some bell peppers and onions that have been tossed in olive oil. It is such an easy dinner.

Peppers, onions, zucchini, and tomatoes cooking in an air fryer basket.

You can serve this on some crunchy bread with a side salad to make an easy meal on a busy weeknight, or toss the veggies with some pasta, parmesan cheese, and more olive oil to make a cheesy veggie pasta!

Sourdough pasta with air fried vegetables and Italian sausage.

How Do You Store Leftovers?

Once cooled, leftover Italian sausage should be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator. Leftover sausage keeps well for several days, so it is a great way to meal prep some flavorful recipes.

Air fried Italian sausages cut in different ways on a white plate.

🙋‍♀️ Frequently Asked Questions

What temperature is used to Air Fry sausage?

Sausage is best when air-fried at 360°F. You could technically cook it at a lower temperature for a longer time or a higher temperature for a shorter amount of time, but in the testing I did, higher temperatures made the sausage shrivel, and the long cooking time defeats the purpose of using the air fryer.

How long do you air fry Italian sausage?

Sausage should take about 10-12 minutes to cook in the air fryer, though thicker sausages might take a little longer to cook. (DIfferent air fryer models might also take different times to cook.)

Whole cooked air fried Italian sausages on a white plate.

Did you make this recipe? If so, please leave a comment and rating below. I love hearing from you.

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