Authentic learning is gaining attention due to being perceived as a more engaging and effective way of teaching students. Many schools are incorporating authentic learning into their curricula, and numerous studies have also been conducted investigating the effectiveness of authentic learning in improving student outcomes. Various primary studies have been conducted in Turkey examining the effect of authentic learning on academic achievement and learning retention, which have an important place among learning outcomes. It was observed that the results of these individual studies reported different effect sizes on the effectiveness of authentic learning. This review aimed to report the overall effect sizes by analyzing the results of experimental and quasi-experimental studies examining the effect of authentic learning on academic achievement and learning retention through meta-analysis. Of the 180 studies listed as a result of the literature search, 11 studies (13 effect sizes) for academic achievement and four studies (six effect sizes) for the learning retention variables that meet the inclusion criteria were coded and analyzed. The results of the analysis showed a moderate overall effect size for the effectiveness of authentic learning on both academic achievement (g = 0.991) and learning retention (g = 0.925). It is possible to say that the overall effect sizes obtained as a result of the meta-analysis are moderate, quite remarkable for educational research, and that authentic learning is more effective in increasing academic achievement and learning retention than traditional education processes.