Breville the Joule® Oven Air Fryer Pro

The Joule oven arrived (Nov. 2023) without drama. Easily unpacked, wiped down, and ran 20 min. Pizza mode for first cycle burn-in. Slight smell of plastic but no smoke or hiccups. The Wifi (2.5 only) and Bluetooth setups were easy with the iOS Joule app. To my surprise the oven’s firmware was upgraded after Wifi connected to the gateway. I like that feature a lot and had no idea with all the literature read including the online owner’s manual. Also the power cord plug (US/CA) is now a low-profile type with a 45 deg. wire exit to save space in back of the countertop. Older videos online show a larger plug.

The oven gets hot on top. Blazing hot top in “Air Fryer” mode. The optional cutting board is recommended and does a decent job of insulating cabinets (the cheaper bamboo knockoff board). Just installed quartz countertops and a heatproof mat is also recommended. Bottom gets warm enough for concern. The left side and back are hot to touch. Right side only warm. Please be aware in high temperature modes or long duration cooks.

…After many cooks under my belt the Joule app Autopilot directed cook recipes just seem to be suggestions. Tried a 3-step Autopilot pizza recipe that actually took 1/2 the suggested time or otherwise would have been burnt to a crisp. What would be really cool Breville is to allow users to save custom Autopilot, multistage cooks on the Joule app to be recalled at any time. The Autopilot Joule feature is very powerful and sets this oven apart from the competition. But at this time Autopilot is limited by only allowing published recipe cooks. Again you can override time/ temperature with the dials on the oven. Once familiar and recipes repeated do not want to hover over the oven while cooking. Otherwise, gets used as a regular dial controlled oven which is $100 cheaper without the Joule feature (BOV900). Let’s hope Breville adds custom cook option to the Autopilot and just a software change. Like PIZZA mode 425F 1 min, then 350F 7 min, turn off and beep. User configured.

…This oven is huge. When extra counter space is needed the oven is unplugged and moved. But to my delight I can fit a 16 x 12 x 2 in. pan inside this oven! Takes up all of the available rack area with little room for vertical air movement but convection mode helps out. Original plan for the BOV950 was to use as a warm meat holding oven like resting full briskets at 150F until serving (up to 12-16 hrs). Excellent large, multi-tasking oven that uses less electrical energy over a full-size kitchen oven. Gets used daily.

Update: the app allows preheating without autostarting the timer and enables modes which aren’t on the main screen. That fixes the main thing that annoyed me, and after living with it for a month, the dang thing does an incredible job of cooking. BTW, get the cutting board for the top – it’s so worth it to have a cool top surface. So I consider it now a five star device which I love *almost* as much as I expected to. Integration with home assistant so I can blink lights and stuff when it needs attention would put it at six stars out of five. ?

No Home Assistant integration yet, but maybe someday.

Original review follows, because I’m not editing history; I said what I said at the time, even if it was borderline wrong. ?‍♂️
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The idea of a smart oven is awesome, as is the guided cooking. ChefStep almost got it right, then Breville bought them and I guess everything stopped?

This thing is really nicely made and works well. But there are two things which are annoying me enough that I really wish I had preserved the box.
1: the app is absurdly limited, and even though they obviously have an API so Alexa works, the API isn’t documented anywhere. There’s supposedly a Google voice integration, but the link on their setup page is broken, so no Hey Google for you. No Home Assistant integration either, despite supposedly having a developer on staff who said it was coming soon a year ago.

2 – you can’t just preheat the oven. Alexa can preheat the oven, ans the app can preheat the oven *in a recipe*, but there’s no way to just use the front panel or the app to preheat to 350. You can say 350 for 15 minutes, but as soon as the oven is preheated, the timer starts. So they expect you two stand in front of the oven with your food all ready to throw in at the moment the preheating is done. The timer pauses when you open the door, but it’s a small oven so you’re losing heat now. You can can reset the timer, but as you’re increasing the time, it’s still counting down. So you turn to 15:00, and then it goes to 14:59, so you rotate again to get to 15 then 16 minutes. Every second, the number on the display is goes down by one, so it’s a really aggravating experience. And of course there’s no timer for how long it’ll take to preheat. Sure, there’s a thermometer in there which knows the current temperature and could calculate based on the time it’s taking to increase the temperature how many more time intervals it’ll take to reach the temperature, but obviously basic machine learning isn’t a popular enough buzzword at Breville.l to apply it in a smart oven.

All those buttons and all that intelligence, and no friggin way to just separately preheat or start the timer like literally every other oven which has ever been made. Otherwise, this thing is great. But holy cow, how did they overlook the most basic feature?

Also, I’m a software engineer, not some old technology-averse curmudgeon who doesn’t understand modern humanity. ?

This oven is truly large, so be sure to measure your space first and consider that it is recommended by the manufacturer that you have space on the sides and back for air circulation and heat dissipation.
The instructions are easy to follow and provide plenty of options. My favorite setting is Proof. I really did not think that this function would work well because proofing can be tricky, but it has been perfect every time during my weekly bread baking operation. The air fry setting may not work as well as a single use air fryer, but it works decently and all the other functions make it a worthwhile purchase for our household. The outside gets HOT during some operations. The removable crumb tray is fantastic. The included pans all work well. Cleaning after preparing an item like chicken wings can be difficult, but that was expected. We love this oven!

I bought my first Breville appliance years ago and was so satisfied with the quality that slowly the brand crowded out everything else when it was time for kitchen replacements. That includes everything from juicers, to coffee bean grinders to stand alone toaster, to tea maker to their Barista Touch Espresso machine. I owned one of their toaster ovens for a number of years but when the fan gave out I opted for another aggressive competitor I won’t name. That oven turned out to be a space saver due to its design, but just too limiting as to its internal size. I recently gave it to a friend and opted to go back to this Breville flagship oven. I was anxious to see what innovations they had incorporated and how smart it had become in its evolution.

First and most noticeable is its larger size. It’s really a behemoth at 21 inches wide, though just 16 inches of that is usable oven width. Its internal usable height is around 8 inches; enough for most projects, but still a bit tight if you’d planned to cook a medium sized turkey or a large chicken. For my needs the size is sufficient since I cook for just one or two. The controls look very similar to my last oven with a few extra options listed. There are design features that may seem small but I find very convenient, like the oven rack sliding outward when you open the oven door. It makes for easier access and fewer hand burning incidents. The construction feels solid and robust as you would expect from Breville and at this price point. The circulating fan is on the side of the oven as opposed to the back and seems sufficiently large to circulate the air inside for faster cooking and frying. The depth inside is sufficient for me and I like how the rear of the oven has a circular convex to allow for the diameter of a frozen pizza.

Setting the oven up was seamless and very automated after downloading the associated app. I found it very interesting that Breville seems to have licensed the content for multiple online cooking resources that you have access to via the app. That’s helpful in getting ideas and planning new meals. As for it’s connectedness, I love that when you preheat the oven, you’ll get an alert on your phone when it’s reached your target temperature. I wasn’t sure what use being connected to the internet carried, but realized this was one seemingly small but extremely helpful uses. The temperature seems consistent and strong and tasks as simple as cooking a baked sweet potato produced perfect results with a crispy skin and tender juicy inside. I also like to cook some dishes on my oven top and then finish them in the oven. Like searing my steak and finishing inside the oven, as well as cooking dense frittatas and then finishing in a heated oven rather than flipping them from the pan onto a dish and back into the pan to finish. That always resulted in too many messes and burns. My frittata today came out perfectly finished in the oven.

Therein, though, lies my one surprise and perhaps small disappointment. To me, what makes an appliance “smart” is the amount of information it is equipped to measure and make useful. In today’s kitchen that translates into a probe or thermometer. Many dishes, especially meats are considered “done” depending on the internal temperature of what you’re cooking.. This oven can set and even adjust the overall temperature of the oven itself, but knows nothing of the temp inside what you’re cooking. That’s why I was deeply disappointed there is no provision for a temperature probe with this oven. My full sized oven has that feature and it’s connected so will alert me when whatever I’m cooking has reached its optimal temp. So while this oven has various smart and convenient features and I’m loving it so far, the omission of a probe is disappointing. If i want my steak medium at 135-140 degrees, I need to anticipate, guess then open the door to insert a meat thermometer, risking getting burned and letting out the even heat inside the oven. That’s a pretty important missing feature that several competitors even at a lower price point have incorporated and forces you to be more present and attentive. That, to me is what makes an appliance really “smart”.

If I can note one other design element I wish Breville would address, it’s the ease and ability to clean the inside of the oven. With the oven racks removed, I’d like to be able to easily swab the sides for cleaning. In my last oven and this one as well, the sides contain metal additions jutting out on the sides to help hold the racks. They greatly impede cleaning efforts and with their rear pointing triangular edges can injure your hand if not careful. If they must be in there, perhaps give them the ability to be unclipped for cleaning.

Overall, I’m very impressed and happy with the oven and will enjoy using it for several years as the last one I owned. I already subscribe to several of the online recipe resources but like that they are conveniently aggregated in one spot on the app for reference, and that’s a big plus. I’s a bit pricier than some of its competition but you can have confidence in Breville for solid performance and high quality.

Is it supposed to be this way? Brand new, got it yesterday ran through the setup of cleaning it from factory and noticed the door was slightly open up where it meets the silicon seal. Now I’m trying its first air fry and the steam is coming out of the top corner closest to the Digital screen. How long will the screen last for if steam is coming close to it? Better quality control? I don’t know,but for nearly 600$ I expect better is all. Was a birthday gift for my wife and I really do not want the trouble of having to send it back. I just wanted this to work out without problems. Ya know? Wtf?

Really disappointed in this oven. For $500, I expect a flawless product. I was willing to overlook a few things until I noticed a gap in the door. Why is there a gap, and why does Breville claim it’s the design? I don’t buy it.

Gap starts on the upper left hand top of the door, then the corner, and about 3/4 down the left side. Why? Why would the door not close all the way? I can see the corner gap being functional to let out steam, but why a gap where there is a rubber seal that should be flush against the door? Breville?

So this is the fifth air fryer I’ve tried, sixth, if you include the unimpressive microwave air fryer combo that I promptly returned. One thing until now that I’ve always found an issue with most air fryers is even cooking whether it’s the basket style that food usually needs flipped because the bottoms tend to get mushy to even other oven style ones that the heat element was built into the side and distributed with a fan. This one has heating elements on the top and bottom which give excellent even cooking most recently I tried the ninja, dual compartment, air fryer, toaster oven with that one because the heating element was built into the side and distributed with a fan stuff like cooking a pizza usually required rotating because the side closest to the fan always cooked first or started to brown before the other side. I’ll talk more about the ninja because it’s the closest shape and size comparison to the Breville functions like the toast setting on the ninja weren’t customizable enough even on the lowest setting toast would come out extremely dark. to get a light toast or beagle, you would have to keep an eye on the color yourself and pull it out before the end of the cycle. The Breville is a couple inches wider than the ninja, but due to the placement of the heating element even though the width isn’t a whole lot bigger on the outside, it’s a lot larger on the inside for a larger capacity it is also shorter than the ninja, despite it being wider, looks less cluttered on the countertop. Now the Breville is priced higher than the ninja believe the ninja runs about $330 compared to $500 for the Breville. Oh, but that is in my opinion, well worth the extra money when you consider a much larger cooking capacity, much better more user-friendly controls and even better included accessories. The ninja comes with a air fryer basket and a couple of baking trays. I Breville comes with a baking tray and a wire rack Insert for stuff like roasting, And even a pizza tray. Most of the additional accessories for the ninja are sold separately. But not only are you getting better heat distribution, more capacity, and more accessories, you’re getting smart control function that link with the app through the smart phone and have pre-loaded recipes with step-by-step directions to make a number of great dishes. All these things make the Breville, one of the best air fryers I’ve tried, but one of my favorite features I’ve saved for last is the Simple yet functional magnets installed on the inside of the door that actually attached to the tray when it’s in the middle setting (which is the one you would always use your air fryer basket) these magnets, attach themselves to the air fryer basket or whatever tray you would have on the middle setting so that as you open the door, it pulls the tray out about halfway which is super convenient and safe for keeping your fingers clear reaching in and burning them on the above or below racks. This is all around hands-down my favorite air fryer I’ve ever tried. If you are already familiar with the Breville. Joule sous vide then you’ll love the similar feel to the oven app. The first thing I tried cooking after getting it all set up were the sticks, some thing that in every other air fryer, I’ve tried has a Town challenges in the basket style air fryers that have to be flipped halfway through, and even then the bottoms would start to get soggy through the first half of the cook and never really firm up after flipping in the ninja air fryer at 10 minutes on 400° they would come out soft and fall apart and we’re difficult to even dip and condiments the same fish sticks at 400° in six minutes with the preheat included often crispy well golden browned, fish sticks, that I didn’t have to worry about crumbling apart trying to dip them. I can’t wait to use some of the other functions like the crescent rolls that are pictured on the cover that you remove from the glass when I’m boxing it, where with the auto pilot function does everything from proofing to baking. Its not only an air fry‘s, but bakes, roast, boils, proofs, and dehydrate.

I was very upset to find out that the interior has a non-stick coating. We all know about the health risks of it at this point. Two weeks past delivery date and sure enough it started peeling where the racks are sliding. Next I’ll be spitting out these particles with my food. Considering the price, it’s a piece of junk.

Had a cheaper version of this model for a few years and used it all the time. Wanted a newer model with a light inside. Broiled a rib eye steak as soon as I got it, came out great. I also use it to finish off microwaved baked potatoes. 7 minutes in the microwave 5 minutes in toaster oven soft inside crispy skins on the out side. Frozen pizza comes out hot and bubbly in just a few minutes. Hardly use my regular oven any more. Has many built in cooking cycles that make cooking a quick meal easy. Trust you’ll love this one. Hardly a day goes by that I don’t use it. Oh, easy to clean any drips with a pull out tray that I rinse off or pop in the dishwasher easy peasy. A bit pricy but well worth it in my opinion.

Great little oven, however; it’s not at all worth the additional cost for the “smart” version. Unless I suppose you’re following a recipe from the app you can’t actually control the oven at all unless you’re standing right in front of it. This is especially true for the smart home integration, which cannot start the oven unless you physically push the start button. If I’m standing right in front of the over, why on Earth would I ask Alexa to set the oven to bake… it’s so silly and useless.
Adding to that, and something very much NOT advertised, is the fact that you loose phase cooking with the smart version and that button is replaced with “a little more”. Honestly, add a second button and have both functions available.
Ultimately I’m regretting this purchase. The app connectivity and voice control (not that you can find any of the commands listed) are utterly useless and the one cool function I would have used, phase cooking, is missing. What a waste. Just get the 900 for a hundred less and let Breville figure this out.

EDIT: I’ve had the over for a few months now, indeed we never use the smart features and find autopilot confusing and annoying to cook with. The over is awesome though, overall. That said, after a few months all the stainless around the door has started to discolor and Breville support says that is normal. They did offer to swap the oven out for a new one but said the same issue would occur. Crazy that an oven this expensive should have such an issue, dropping the star rating for this reason. It’s really bad.