This slow cooker whole chicken is a rotisserie style seasoned chicken made with the help of the crock pot. It’s a super easy dinner option and the leftover chicken can be used in countless other dishes!
I love rotisserie chicken, but it can be pricey and is often filled with sodium and sometimes even preservatives and other questionable ingredients. This slow cooker roasted chicken has just a few minutes of prep time, you can set it in the morning and come home to have dinner waiting for you! You simply can’t go wrong with slow cooker comfort food classics like slow cooker brisket, slow cooker beef bourguignon and a whole chicken. This is an all time favorite recipe in my house, along with my famous baked chicken wings.
For the longest time, every time I went to Costco I’d pick up one of their rotisserie chickens for a cheap and easy meal. Then one day I read the ingredient list, and there are some additives in those chickens that I’d rather not feed my family. This slow cooker whole chicken is SO easy to make, and you can have a fresh cooked rotisserie style chicken any time you want with more natural ingredients!
Can you cook a whole chicken in a slow cooker?
Yes you can! The first step is to choose your chicken, I like to use organic whenever possible. You want to make sure that your chicken will fit inside your crock pot, I use my larger oval crock pot for this task which is big enough to accommodate almost any sized chicken. If you’re using a smaller round slow cooker, opt for a smaller bird.
The chicken gets coated in a simple spice blend, then placed in the slow cooker atop a ring of foil. The foil acts as a rack to keep the chicken from steaming in its own juices as it cooks.
Is it safe to cook a whole chicken in a slow cooker?
It is safe to cook a whole chicken in a slow cooker, but it’s typically recommended that you cook the chicken on high heat for at least one hour for food safety purposes. This recipe calls for cooking the chicken on high heat for the entire cook time.
How long will it take to cook a chicken in a slow cooker?
It typically takes 3-4 hours to cook a chicken on high heat in the slow cooker, and 8 hours to cook on low heat. As mentioned above, if you plan to cook your chicken on the lower heat setting, be sure to let it cook at high for one hour before you switch to low to make sure the chicken is at the correct temperature for food safety purposes.
At the end of your cook time, you’ll have a juicy and flavorful bird!
At this point, your slow cooker chicken is just missing one thing: that golden brown skin normally associated with rotisserie chicken. I transfer my chicken to a baking pan and broil it for about 5 minutes to get that beautiful golden brown skin that everybody loves.
When I cook a 5 pound chicken for my family, we typically end up with plenty of leftovers which I use to create dinner for the next night.
Once you try this slow cooker whole chicken, you’ll never want to go back to store bought rotisserie chicken again!
Ideas for your leftover chicken
- Chicken Taco Soup
- Chicken Ranch Tacos
- Chicken and Wild Rice Soup
- Buffalo Ranch Chicken Dip
- Chicken Taquitos
Slow cooker whole chicken video
Slow Cooker Whole Chicken
Ingredients
- 5 lb whole chicken neck and giblets removed
- cooking spray
- 1 tablespoon brown sugar
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 1 teaspoon pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 tablespoon smoked paprika
Instructions
- In a small bowl, mix together the brown sugar, salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder and smoked paprika.
- Coat a large slow cooker with cooking spray. Roll a piece heavy duty aluminum foil into a ring shape to fit into the slow cooker as a rack.
- Place the chicken on top of the foil ring. Rub the spice mixture all over the chicken.
- Cover and cook on HIGH for 3-4 hours or until thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the thigh registers at 165 degrees or higher.
- Transfer the chicken to a sheet pan or baking dish and broil in the oven for 4-5 minutes or until chicken skin is brown and crispy. Serve.
Notes
- Nutritional facts assume calorie and fat counts for skin. If you're looking to cut calories, remove the skin before eating.
Super easy to follow used 1/2 the salt and smoked paprika that was called for and it was still super tasty and oh so juicy. Wiped my crockpot and bird in olive oil so the seasoning would stick &my 5 pounder was done in 4 hours. No more store chicken roasters the sodium is off the charts and this was by far much more juicy. Thank you. 😋
So glad to hear you enjoyed it, thank you for reporting back!
Awesome recipe! Incredibly easy. Both the dark and white meat were cooked too perfection. Love the method of crisping the skin! My boyfriend devoured it too! I’ll be making this again and again. Thank you!!
So happy you enjoyed it, thanks for reporting back!
Truly delicious! This recipe is a keeper, thank you.
I tried this today. I had it on high for 4 hours. It was delicious! We don’t eat the skin so I didn’t have to broil it. EASY and Yummy.
So glad you enjoyed it!
I am out of the house from 8:30 am – 6pm, any chance I could just leave this on low? And for how many hours? Can’t wait to try it!
You really should leave it on high for at least one hour for food safety reasons. Other than that there’s no reason why you can’t leave it in all day, it’ll just be fall apart tender when you get home!
Easy and fabulous!
So glad you enjoyed it, thank you for leaving a comment!
This was great. Probably the easiest dinner I’ve ever made. My chicken was just shy of 4 lbs so I set my slow cooker on high for 3 hours. The thermometer showed that it wasn’t quite up to temp so I left the thermometer in and cooked it another 20-30 minutes until it was just right. I did use the bed of chopped veggies like some other commenters mentioned, and they were refrigerated for about an hour beforehand, so maybe that slowed down the cooking time a bit. I’ve never managed to get a chicken to be this juicy with oven roasting, so I see no need to ever go back. Plus, no trussing!
So happy to hear you enjoyed this one, I make it almost every week! Thanks for reporting back!
How long should I slow cook a 3 pond bird on low?
This chicken should be cooked on high for food safety reasons, I’d recommend cooking a 3 pound chicken on high for 2-3 hours!
Wow zowie! So tender and moist, delicious!
I will cut the salt to 1 tsp instead of 2 to cut the sodium down a bit
t’s a keeper recipe!
SO glad to hear you enjoyed it, thanks for reporting back!
Can u start with a frozen whole chicken?
I wouldn’t recommend it because of food safety concerns.
What can I use in place of aluminum foil? I don’t use that in cooking food.
A lot of people have been resting their chicken on a bed of potatoes to act as a rack.
Can i do this in a conventional oven i dont have a crock pot big enough…
I’m not exactly sure how this would work in a conventional oven as you really need the enclosed crock pot to keep everything moist and juicy.
I have a huge roaster pan with lid would that work and still do low and slow??
Dutch oven at 200 degrees is the same as a low setting on the crock pot. In some ways the Dutch oven is better than the crock pot.
I really followed the recipe except didn’t have smoked paprika so used paprika, cumin and a bit of cayenne.
Instead of the foil ring, i used carrots, potatoes and onions, which seemed dry after 3 hrs so i threw in some veggie stock.
Broiled the whole thing. The flavor was great and for 2 people, we have a whole other meal.
Thank you
So glad to hear it was a hit, I appreciate you coming back to comment!
I am trying this tonight for Valentine’s Day. My husband and I got married and moved in together two days ago, but unfortunately our kitchen isn’t finished yet (joys of unforeseen issues in a home renovation!) Anyways, we are limited to crockpot and my rice cooker right now, so this will be great! I also love that it is dairy free. We only eat meat once a week or so, so I will freeze the leftovers. I’m also going to put a bed of cubed potatoes, carrots, onions, celery, and mushrooms beneath it in place of the foil to make it more of a “one pot wonder” meal! I can’t wait to try it. The reviews look good!
Happy Valentine’s Day, I actually made this one again last night! Hope you enjoy
This recipe looks delicious and I plan to try it this week. What is the purpose of the brown sugar? We are watching our sugar intake–just wondering if it would be a problem if it was cut down in quantity or left out completely? Any thoughts on what I could use instead? Can you taste the sugar in the finished product??
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The sugar helps to caramelize the skin at the end so that it’s brown and crispy. You can leave it out if you prefer.
Wow!!! This chicken was super juicy delicious!!! I dropped a pre-cook comment yesterday as I was anticipating the fruits of thy labor, and the fruit was much juicer and tastier than I had imagined! And the labor, not much at all, which was I had given this recipe a 5-star 😁 pre-cook rating, the prep work and prep time was very minimal, especially when considering the end result! I Ate Half of this 4.7-pound little plumpy fella right then & there on the spot when it came out of its final 5 minutes of broil time in the oven which was necessary to get the skin and outside nice & crispy! I couldn’t stop going back over to the kitchen every few minutes and picking away at another juicy little piece there in the bottom of the pot, I went to bed feeling like porky the pig! 😉
– Thanks Again Sara, my first time trying a recipe from your site…..I’ll be back for more for sure!!!
Thanks so much Anthony, so happy to hear you enjoyed it!
Are you supposed to add any liquid on the bottom of the slow cooker?
Nope the chicken will produce its own liquid!
Just tossed a plumpy little 5 pounder (4.7 to be more exact) into my new (thanks Dina) Hamilton Beach slow cooker. I will drop the follow-up review later this evening after I go to town on this little fellow! I’m starting off with 5 stars on this pre-cook review for 2 reasons, #1 is the instructions were easy peezy (is peezy a real word? who cares, it sounds cool & kids like it so…), and #2 reason is…..I got a good feeling this is gonna be like totally super super juicy!!!!!
5 hours & I will have the final review…..I’ll be back 😉
Hope you enjoy it, it’s one of my favorites!
Would love to try this but my broiler no longer works (oven does though). Would I do anything differently to make this, or follow recipe as is and just omit browning the skin (which I pull off and don’t eat anyhow)?
You can just omit the browning part, I’ve done that when I’m in a hurry and it’s still great!
OH.
MY.
GOD.
SO DELICIOUS!!
Thanks for saving my marriage!! lol
Glad you enjoyed this recipe lol, thanks for reporting back!
If I cook a 5 # chicken on high for an hour, how long would you suggest I cook the chicken on low?
4-6 hours!
This is my families new favorite way to make a whole chicken! Thanks, and it’s so easy!!
Happy to hear you enjoyed it, thanks for reporting back!
Ok,so I’m about to try this recipe for the first time I hope it turns out ok