Air Fryer Crescent Roll Baby Cinnamon Rolls

About this recipe

Fluffy, gooey crescent roll cinnamon rolls made right in your air fryer in minutes. An easy shortcut dessert the whole family will love with minimal cleanup required.

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The holidays are in full swing and the year 2022 is almost over. Where has the time gone? I feel the year just started! It went by so fast!

I hope you’ve had an incredible holiday season, but we’re not done yet! Are you searching for the ultimate New Year’s Eve party treat? These Mini Cinnamon Rolls are for you! We’ve got the goodness of some awesome Cinnabon cinnamon rolls made with ease with Pillsbury canned crescent rolls!

Not only do the crescent rolls speed up the process by A LOT, but using an air fryer speeds things up too compared to baking in an oven!

If you’re short on time but want to serve a crowd-pleaser for your holiday parties, you gotta give this air fryer baby crescent roll cinnamon roll recipe a try! As I discuss more in my free guide Make Cooking Fun!, my top 5 tips to explore your potential in the kitchen, you really should use up what you have! I actually had a second can of canned crescent rolls after I had made my Air Fryer Mini Pigs in a Blanket, since I thought I was going to need two cans but I ended up only needing one! Furthermore, I had making cinnamon buns on my bucket list Live to Cook one-month challenge!

Don’t forget to watch the video to see how easy these Air Fryer Crescent Roll Cinnamon Rolls are to make, even if it’s a last-minute decision! If you’re not already, please subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell button so you receive all of the notifications when a new video recipe goes live! I love to share the video recipes to give you a tangible view of the recipe that will guarantee you success! Let’s get baking!

Golden-brown air fryer cinnamon rolls with cinnamon swirls dusted with sugar on a dark plate.

Why You’ll Love Air Fryer Crescent Roll Cinnamon Buns

Few ingredients: We save so many ingredients by using the canned Pillsbury crescent rolls to make the buns themselves! Otherwise, the vanilla icing and the brown sugar mix each don’t need many ingredients either!
Beginner-friendly: This is an awesome recipe excellent for cooks of all levels! You still get the experience of making your own cinnamon sugar filling and your own frosting, but you won’t have to stress about making the dough. You can test that out on another occasion!
Budget-friendly: Cinnamon rolls made with the crescent rolls are very cheap! Probably the priciest part of the recipe will actually be the crescent rolls themselves, and even then they will not make the slightest dent in your wallet! All other ingredients in this recipe are typical commodities that you probably already have on hand so you won’t have to go out of your way to buy them!
Fast: This probably is the selling point for this recipe in my opinion! If you want a dessert that looks like you’ve spent tons of time on it but it actually was prepared in a flash, then this is the recipe for you! The crescent rolls bake so well in the air fryer and you save tons of time not having to make your cinnamon roll dough from scratch!

What air fryer are you using?▼

For this recipe, I used theNinja Foodi 6-in-1 2-Basket Air Fryer. I like that it has thefollowing six settings:

Air Fry
Air Broil
Reheat
Dehydrate
Bake
Roast

To be fair, I did purchase the air fryer to mainly use the “air fry” setting, but on occasion I do find the other settings quite handy! The two baskets are also very convenient if you’re making two different recipes in the air fryer. For instance, if you want to have air fryer donuts with your cinnamon buns, you can bake the donuts in one basket and these in the other. There’s a smart setting to ensure that they finish baking at the same time, holding the one basket with the item that is ready sooner. No need to wait on anything!

To get a detailed review of my first impressions upon purchasing this air fryer, check outthis video.

Twelve baked cinnamon rolls dusted with cinnamon sugar arranged on a dark plate.

Ingredients for Air Fryer Pillsbury Crescent Roll Cinnamon Rolls

Scroll to the bottom of this post for the FULL PRINTABLE RECIPE CARD with all ingredient quantities and instructions to save for later. You can also adjust the recipe based on how many cinnamon rolls you’re craving - whether it’s just for an easy treat or you’er making a lot for a major New Year’s Eve party, everything will automatically adjust for you!

Ingredients for air fryer cinnamon rolls: crescent rolls, icing sugar, cinnamon, corn syrup, butter, and water.

For the Cinnamon Sugar

For the Vanilla Icing

For the Crescent Roll Cinnamon Rolls

Grands! Crescent rolls
Butter

Air fryer cinnamon rolls dusted with cinnamon sugar arranged on a dark gray plate.

How to Make Crescent Rolls in the Air Fryer

For the Cinnamon Sugar

Mix together 1 part cinnamon, 2 parts white granulated sugar and 1 part brown sugar. Set aside until needed later.

Cinnamon sugar mixture in white bowl being measured with spoon for air fryer cinnamon rolls.

Cinnamon sugar mixture being sifted into a white bowl with brown and white sugars visible.

Pouring sugar mixture into a white bowl containing cinnamon and brown sugar for cinnamon roll filling.

Cinnamon sugar mixture being stirred in a white bowl with a spoon

For the Icing

Mix together the confectioners sugar, corn syrup, vanilla extract and a splash of water using a whisk. Add the water 1 Tbsp at a time to ensure you can control the consistency - you can go for a thinner icing or a thicker kind at this stage.

Whisking together confectioners sugar and liquid ingredients in a glass bowl for cinnamon roll icing.

Confectioners sugar being poured into a glass bowl for making icing.

Confectioners sugar in a glass bowl for making icing glaze.

Whisking together white icing ingredients in a clear glass bowl with a whisk.

For the Crescent Roll Cinnamon Rolls

Open the packaging for the crescent roll and roll out one of the dough portions over a clean baking sheet, lined with parchment paper.

Grab a pastry brush and apply butter all over the surface of the dough. Then grab a generous portion of the cinnamon sugar from earlier and sprinkle/spread all over.

Starting from the shorter edge of the pastry, start rolling the dough into a thick, tight roll. Repeat the same for any remaining portions of the crescent roll dough. Cut the prepared rolls into smaller portions by cutting them into 6 equal portions.

Melted butter being brushed onto crescent roll dough in a white bowl with a pastry brush.

Rolled crescent roll dough with cinnamon sugar filling on parchment paper, ready for air frying.

Buttered crescent roll dough with cinnamon sugar sprinkled on surface, hand touching the pastry.

Cinnamon sugar being sprinkled onto buttered crescent roll dough for cinnamon rolls.

Hand sprinkling cinnamon sugar mixture over buttered crescent roll dough.

Hands rolling cinnamon sugar-coated crescent roll dough into a tight spiral for air fryer cinnamon rolls.

Hand rolling crescent dough with cinnamon sugar filling into a tight spiral for baby cinnamon rolls.

Preheat the air fryer at 360 F for 3-7 minutes. Bake until the pastry has puffed and is golden brown all over.

Ninja air fryer preheated to 360°F on the display screen ready for cooking.

Golden brown cinnamon rolls arranged in air fryer basket, ready to bake.

Pour the icing over the prepared cinnamon rolls and enjoy!

Freshly baked crescent roll cinnamon rolls with white icing drizzle on a gray plate.

I don’t have an air fryer! How do I make these in an oven?▼

To bake in the oven, set the temperature to 375 F and bake for 12-15 minutes.

Six golden-brown crescent roll cinnamon rolls with cinnamon-sugar swirls on a light surface.

Six golden-brown cinnamon roll pinwheels on parchment paper in a red baking tray in the oven.

Tips for Soft & Fluffy Air Fryer Crescent Roll Cinnamon Rolls

There’s not much you can do wrong to result in these crescent roll baby cinnamon buns not soft and fluffy. Just keep an eye on that golden brown color that you see up there and you will be set.
In terms of the spirals and adding the cinnamon sugar, be patient and spread well, going edge to edge and roll into a tight even cigar.
For the frosting, you can adjust the consistency to be as thick or as thin as you want by adjusting the amount of liquid used in the frosting. Instead of water, you can easily use milk or buttermilk.

Serving Suggestions Air Fryer Cinnamon Buns with Crescent Rolls

These Air Fryer Pillsbury Crescent Rolls cinnamon buns are totally satisfying enough on their own for a breakfast, snack or dessert!

However, I really recommend them as part of a magical holiday brunch. To make these part of a wholesome meal for a special occasion, you could pair them with a savoury egg dish. Some ideas include a Classic French Omelette, a Cheesy Egg Souffle or an Authentic Croque Monsieur or Croque Madame! If you want to have a spread of finger food, I recommend a Homemade McDonald’s Sausage McMuffin, McDonald’s Breakfast Bagels, Deviled Eggs, a Tim Horton’s Farmer’s Wrap, or even Pepperoni Pizza Bagels!

For beverages, you can’t go wrong with coffee or hot chocolate! If you’re like me and you love chocolate, a simple Cafe Mocha will be awesome with these! You could even have White Hot Chocolate or a Pumpkin Spice Latte for more cinnamon goodness! If you want a cold beverage, try my Iced Eggnog Dalgona Latte to keep the holiday theme or for the chocolate lovers, try out my Chocolate Cream Cold Brew!

Storing Leftover Mini Cinnamon Buns

This Air Fryer Mini Cinnamon Buns recipe will totally make an amount of cinnamon buns that are perfect for a party! However, if you’re just making these for yourself or for two, one crescent roll will yield plenty that you probably won’t be able to eat in one sitting (but if you do… I won’t judge!). All you need to do is simply transfer the leftover baby cinnamon buns into an airtight container in the refrigerator.

I recommend you reheat in the air fryer for best results. If you don’t have an air fryer, you can reheat in the microwave, but I found that it made the cinnamon buns too soft and they lost their crispiness on the edges and they just became doughy.

If reheating in the air fryer, simply heat at 350 F for about 2-3 minutes or entirely warmed through.

More Holiday Treats!

Pumpkin Spice Latte Cupcakes

Let me know what you think of this recipe in the comments! If you’ve tried this recipe, be sure to post it on social media and tag it with #cookingwithanadi and mention me @cooking.with.anadi. Thank you!

Recipe by Anadi Misra