7 Best Convection Microwaves of 2026, Tested and Ranked

At 1,100 watts, this is the most powerful microwave in the group, and the advantage shows up in the dull moments rather than the impressive ones. A bowl of cold leftovers comes back hot sooner, and a mug of coffee does not need a second round. If your convection microwave is going to spend most of its life reheating, that extra output is the spec that earns its keep every single day.

The 2.4-inch color screen is the feature we expected to ignore and did not. Twenty-five programs is more than anyone needs, but a screen that names them beats a keypad that makes you look up a code, and the humidity sensor takes most of the guesswork out of reheating. It runs quiet enough that we stopped noticing it, which is more than we can say for the over-the-range units here. The ceramic enamel lining is also the friendliest surface in this group to wipe down after a chicken.

Where it gives ground is the control ladder and the price. Five microwave power levels is a short ladder next to the rest of this set, and the gap is real when you are softening butter rather than blasting a dinner plate. It is priced like a premium appliance and it is new enough that nobody can tell you how it looks at year four. If you reheat more than you bake, the trade is worth it; if you are shopping specifically to bake, the Panasonic’s documented bake mode and longer warranty are the safer buy.

The least expensive way into convection cooking here is also the smallest, and that is the entire pitch. Five modes — microwave, air fry, a grill-and-convection combo, bake, and roast — plus a bake tray and two grill racks, in a body 19.5 inches wide. In a rental kitchen or an apartment where the microwave is the second oven, that combination is the difference between having an oven half and not having one.

The 11.3-inch turntable sets the real limit. Dinner plates, a small casserole, a couple of bagels: yes. A whole chicken or a 12-inch pizza: no. We think that is the right trade for the person this is built for, because the alternative at this end of the market is a plain microwave with no oven half at all. Eleven air fry presets cover the frozen-food basics, and seven auto menus handle popcorn, potatoes, and oatmeal without a decision.

The setting we like most is the combo one, which runs microwave and grill together. It is how you get a crisp top on a casserole without waiting through a full preheat, and it is the mode a plain microwave cannot fake. Just know what you are buying: this is a compact second oven, not a replacement for the range.

There is no turntable in the Crispi, and that single omission is what makes it interesting. A flat glass floor holds a 9-by-11 baking dish, two bowls side by side, or two bags of popcorn, and nothing slides around while the machine works. If you have ever chased a plate back onto a turntable ring mid-cook, you will understand why we kept coming back to this one.

The feature that earns it a place in this guide is FusionCrisp, which microwaves first and then hands off to the air fry element on its own — the two-step sequence that otherwise costs you two appliances and a plate transfer. The air fry side is what Ninja built the machine around: up to 450°F of moving air, with Max Crisp heading five air fry presets. If your reason for wanting a combi microwave is frozen food that comes out crisp, this is the one we point you to.

It is also the heaviest countertop model here at 50 pounds, in a body 20.3 inches wide, wrapped around a 0.9-cubic-foot cavity. That is a lot of counter for the capacity, and it is the trade you make for the flatbed and the air fry hardware. Cleaning is the pleasant surprise: the 5.5-quart glass dish is the cooking vessel, so there is no turntable ring to scrub and no cramped box to reach into.

If there is already a microwave bolted under your cabinets, this is the model that makes the swap worth doing. It is a standard over-the-range unit at 29.9 inches wide and 16.4 tall, with six modes including convection, bake, roast, and air fry, plus the vent fan and cooktop light that no countertop machine can give you.

The 1.5-cubic-foot cavity and 13.6-inch turntable are the biggest combination here short of the Toshiba countertop, and that is the reason to go over the range beyond saving counter space: you get more room because you are also buying the hood. The 300 CFM two-speed vent is modest by range-hood standards but enough for the smoke off a broiler pan, and the light is the part you will notice every night.

The compromise is depth. An over-the-range cavity is shallow at 13.9 inches, so a 13.6-inch turntable fills the floor and there is very little headroom for a rack above it. That limits how much you can stack in convection mode, and it is the honest difference between this and a countertop oven of the same capacity.

In most kitchens the trade works: a vent fan, a light, and 1.5 cubic feet that use no counter at all beat a fancier oven you have to lift onto one. Confirm two things before ordering — whether the kitchen vents outside or recirculates, and the exact cabinet opening — because the install, not the cooking, is where these go wrong.

The first thing to know is that the manual covers the microwave side thoroughly and the air fry side barely at all, which is a strange way to ship a machine whose marquee feature is air frying. That is a shame, because the hardware underneath is the best capacity-per-dollar deal in this guide: 1.5 cubic feet, a 13.6-inch turntable, and 1,000 watts for midrange money. Plan on learning the modes by trial, and budget an evening for it.

A chicken, a 12-inch pizza, a 9-by-13 pan — all of it fits, and the auto bake and roast menus are the ones worth learning first. The sensor programming takes over once you trust it, and the mute function is a small kindness in an open kitchen: you can kill the beeps without hunting through a menu at midnight.

The question mark is longevity. Units that quit tend to do it a couple of years in, past the one-year warranty, which is why this sits below the picks above rather than beside them. Buy it as a value oven — family-size batches, a big cavity, sensible money — and not as a forever appliance.

Twelve convection programs and eight sensor programs is the longest cooking list in this guide, and the R1874T is the one that reads like the oven it is: it browns, bakes, broils, crisps, and roasts, with a low rack and a high rack included so you can run two levels at once. Its dimensions match older Sharp over-the-range convection units, so it drops onto brackets that are already in the cabinet — which is why it turns up in older kitchens and motorhomes as a straight replacement.

If you bake in your microwave rather than just reheating in it, this is the most oven-like machine on the page. A stainless cavity with an interior light, two racks, and enough real convection programming to treat a pan of bars as a normal job rather than an experiment. It is also the oldest design here, and that cuts both ways: the cooking behavior is proven, and the feature list is plainer than the touchscreen machines.

The coverage is the clever part — a year of parts and labor in home, plus six more years of parts on the magnetron, the longest commitment to a single component here. It is the keypad and display that are the aging points rather than the magnetron, so the standard year is the one that matters, and it is worth registering the unit the week it arrives.

Plan the install rather than the cooking. It is 71.5 pounds going into a 30-inch opening with hardware that has to line up with what is already in the cabinet, so have a second set of hands on the day. Once it is up, nobody thinks about the weight again.