Sharp Smart Convection Wall Oven with Microwave Drawer (SWB3085HS) Review

Design and features

• Convection Wall Oven with Microwave Drawer
• Alexa support, with 150 commands
• Full Color 7-inch. TFT Touch Glass Display

This counter-height wall oven really sells itself with its large collection of smart, connected features – from Alexa voice command support to 45 cooking settings. Unlike most ovens, which are controlled by various dials, the SWB3085HS puts most of its functionality on a large 7-inch color TFT touch display.

Using the touch display, you can access all the main functions of the oven and quickly get to the settings without much hunting. It’s certainly not the most responsive display, but the touch target is nice and big and works even if hands are greasy or messy from eating.

Sharp has cleverly made sure that the software at work here is more visual than relying heavily on text. The pictures of the food you might want to cook are large and you don’t have to stare at the small text to figure out where to go.

The SWB3085HS is a modern-looking oven, not surprising given the large display in the middle. It is a 30″ diameter oven with a 5.0 cu.ft. oven and a 1.2 cu.ft. 950W Microwave drawer that can be conveniently opened with a push of a button on the display or a wave of the hand.

All doors feature efficient easy-close technology, and the unit is finished in stainless steel and edge-to-edge black glass. It looks smart, although it won’t appeal to those who prefer their electronics to be more traditional in design.

Inside the oven are three racks, two standard and one designed to slide in and out. These racks can be placed in six different positions, and there is plenty of flexibility to accommodate items of various sizes inside.

I really like the gray interior as it makes seeing inside much clearer than the traditional black.

This is a feature-packed oven, both in terms of smart features (which I largely ignored after the first playthrough) and standard features that would be expected if the cost of entry is so high.

The SWB3085HS includes three cooking modes – grill, bake, and roast. Two hot modes of grill (3500W) and baking (2200W), meat temperature probe, air fry settings and a dedicated mode to keep things warm at a constant temperature. Having a built-in meat probe is great, and you can set the oven to cook until a piece of meat reaches a certain temperature – making sure it doesn’t overcook.

If you go down to the microwave cabinet, which is under the appliance, this includes a maximum output of 950W and various defrosting modes, certain cooking modes (think seafood, rice, baked potatoes), and even warming and softening modes. If you don’t want to use a preset, there are 11 power levels to choose from.

The Alexa integration is neat, and I think it looks futuristic on a sheet or on a website. The idea of ​​talking to your oven should be great; however, in practice, I can’t see many using it before the first setup. First, you need an actual Echo device to run it – rather than this functionality being inside the oven itself.

Setup is a bit of a pain. It took me several attempts to get the oven to connect to the Wi-Fi network, and even when it did, the connection kept dropping out. It’s more difficult than it’s worth, especially with limited control anyway. At least you can control both the oven and the microwave using about 150 Alexa commands,

Working

• The display makes it easy to operate
• Even cooking
• Microwave works fine

I started my tests by seeing how well the Sharp SWB3085HS dissipates heat. This is important, as it ensures that the heat will reach all the different parts of whatever you are cooking.

For this experiment, I loaded a tray full of ceramic beads, set the oven to 400°F, and used a thermal camera to take a picture. On the middle shelf, as the picture below shows (white is hotter), you can see that the heat is distributed evenly, only a few parts are lost.

By moving the tray to the top of the oven, the heat will spread evenly throughout the tray and you will get an even heat on this shelf.

I cooked a tray of frozen fries in the oven using the default oven option. The result was evenly browned throughout, with a glossy finish. Usually, you will find some parts of the fry burning before the others are cooked, but that was not the case here. I repeated this test in air fry mode, and the results were not perfect but still good.

To test the microwave, I ran through all the planned methods – softening the butter, cooking the carrot and finishing the chicken tenders. Overall, everything worked as expected.

Controlling the oven via the touch screen is an advantage and a slight downside. Although the screen is not as responsive as a phone, it takes less power to register commands, it works more as expected. You can set temperatures, choose from a list of settings with beautiful pictures and timers. Those kinds of tasks are much easier on a screen than a dial. You can also save recipes (up to 30) for quick access, so you don’t forget an important step if you don’t write it down.

Still, it can be slow, and I found myself constantly getting annoyed at jumping through the various menus to start cooking.

Should you buy it?