A toaster oven is mainly for toasting, broiling, and reheating food. The usual latest two-sliced toaster represents anywhere ranging from 600 and 1200 Watts and can toast from 1 to 3 minutes. Frequently, a toaster oven is used as a substitute of a typical oven since it heats up fast, allowing it to bake and broil while saving money on electricity. A slow heat cooking option is incorporated in a toaster oven to help cook various foods equally.

Sliced bread was formerly toasted on a flat metal surface held against fire. It had a long handle attached to be able to toast the bread easily in the middle of the fire. But now, an electric toaster oven has discarded this crude method. Crompton & Company was selling an electric and iron wired toasting machine, Eclipse in the United Kingdom in 1893. Unfortunately, it didn't do well in the market.

Earlier efforts in manufacturing electric appliances using iron wiring failed since the wiring can easily be melted and it also brought fire hazards. George Schneider filed the first U.S patent appliance for an electric toaster of the American Electric Heater Company of Detroit.

In 1913, the couple Lloyd Groff Copeman and Hazel Berger Copeman applied different toaster patents. Meanwhile, the Copeman Electric Stove Company developed a toaster that could automatically turn breads over in the same year. After a while, this product was further developed and became a semi-automatic toaster. It automatically shuts off after toasting a bread to prevent burning. This model used a bimetallic strip in toasting breads.

Charles Strite was the first who patented the automatic popup toaster. The bread is ejected (or popped out) automatically after toasting. In 1950, this popup toaster was further developed. The newer models had automatic features that do not need any levers to lower or raise a slice of bread.

There are three varieties of toasters: toaster ovens, popup toasters, and conveyor toasters. Toaster ovens are larger than popup toasters and can be likened to an electric oven. In automatic or popup toasters, bread slices are vertically inserted into slots and ejects the bread when done. Conveyor toasters are suitable for extensive use in the catering industries since they are designed to make many slices of bread, producing 350 to 900 slices per hour.

A convection oven neutralizes unevenly cooked food since it uses a fan to send the heat resulting in fast browning and crisping. It works faster in cooking your food especially during breakfast compared to a standard oven. It is usually more expensive and larger than a standard oven but it can cook food very fast at a lower temperature. It is an energy-saving oven, providing 25% shorter time than the usual period using a standard or radiant oven.

Infrared toaster ovens are flexible, efficient and fast. It cooks food via infrared radiation.

Even with the newer invention of microwave nowadays, many still prefer to use toaster ovens in heating their breads because of the delicious crispness produced. It makes every bite of your bread crunchy outside while retaining the softness inside. Microwaves cannot do this.