Compare the Best Coffee GrindersJanuary 2019

At its core, a coffee grinder is a small machine that take whole coffee beans and runs them through a grinder, providing fresh ground coffee for an excellent brew. While it’s definitely fine to use pre-ground coffee, coffee snobs generally agree that coffee tastes better when you use freshly-ground beans rather than pre-packaged grounds.

Blade grinders

These grinders use sharp blades powered by an electric motor to chop the beans into very fine pieces. These machines are generally the cheapest type of coffee grinder, but they do not produce a particularly even grind - some ground may be significantly different sizes than others, leading to a less-efficient brewing, and less tasty coffee. More troubling, the high RPM of the blades on these type of grinders generates quite a lot of heat, which can lead to actually burning the grounds, making coffee brewed from them taste far more bitter.

Burr grinders

This method of grinding is the traditional way of grinding coffee, and has changed very little since the manual grinders that used to be used. The ‘burrs’ in question are toothed or notched gears, which crush and grind the beans into a uniform manner. They give a far more consistent grind than blade grinders, but tend to be slightly more expensive. Burr grinders also improve on blade grinders by being able to vary the size of the grind, allowing them to be effectively used for a wide variety of coffee brewing methods.

There are two main types of burr grinder: conical and wheel. Conical grinders are quieter but also slighly more expensive than wheel grinders.

Grind Settings

Burr and disc coffee grinders have settings to change the size of the coffee grounds produced by the machine. This is important because different types of brewing methods favour different sizes of grinds - an espresso machine requires an extremely fine blend, whereas using a cafetiere requires far coarser grounds. Many will have pre-programmed settings to allow for easy selection, but will also allow manual adjustment.

For bladed grinders, it is more difficult to adjust the side of the grind, since the blades cannot be modified to cut coarser or finer. However you can gain an approximation of different grind sizes by grinding the beans for longer. As a good rule of thumb 8-10 seconds will give you a coarse grind, with 12-15 seconds giving a medium grind, and 15-20 for a fine grind.

With all types of grinder, you have to experiment a bit to find the perfect grind setting for the coffee you want to make. If you find too many ground leaking into the coffee, try a coarser grind. If you want a more intense flavour, try finer grounds.

Capacity

Coffee grinders all have a different capacity, measuring that amount of ground coffee the machine can hold. Some grinders contain a big hopper that can hold enough grounds for several cafetieres, others will only product enough grounds for a single cup - these usually have inbuilt ‘dose controls’ to make sure only the right amount of grounds are produced at once.

Which capacity is best for you depends on what kind of coffee you mot regularly make - families and companies may prefer a bigger capacity, while solo coffee drinkers may only need a grinder that dispenses a single dose at a time.

Timer

More advanced coffee grinders will allow you to set a timer for how long the grinder will run - this allows you to create the precise grind quantity for the amount of coffee you want to make, especially when using bladed grinders. Some coffee makers will measure out in seconds of grinding, others will measure in cups. In both cases, you will need to experiment to find the right amount of coffee grinds for your chosen method of brewing.

Coffee Grinder Prices

Coffee grinders range in price from £4 to £712 and in total we found prices for 73 coffee grinders. A new coffee grinder costs on average £91 and 80% of coffee grinders are priced between £17 and £203. The most expensive coffee grinder that we found is the Baratza Forte at £712, and the cheapest is the Cliff b074wzmqsk at only £5.

Coffee Grinder Brands - Price Range

Gastroback coffee grinders range in price from £312 to £312, and the highest average coffee grinder price out of all brands is Gastroback coffee grinders with an average price of £312.

Baratza coffee grinders range in price from £0 to £712, and the average price of Baratza coffee grinders is £221 which is the second highest average price of all coffee grinder brands.

Sage coffee grinders start at £135 and their most expensive coffee grinder costs £179. The third highest average coffee grinder price out of all brands is Sage coffee grinders with an average price of £158.

Coffee Grinder Brands - Average Ratings

We have evaluated 20 expert reviews and 632 user reviews for coffee grinders and used this data to evaluate the average rating for each brand of coffee grinder.

Biggest Coffee Grinder Retailers

The biggest coffee grinder retailer by number of products currently for sale is eBay. We found 52 current coffee grinder offers from eBay. The second biggest retailer is Amazon UK with 11 offers. That means eBay is over 4 times bigger than Amazon UK when it comes to coffee grinders. John Lewis is the third biggest retailer with 10 current offers.

When Are Most New Coffee Grinders Released?

July to September is the most common period for new coffee grinders to be released in. If you wait until July 2019 then you might be able to get better features on your coffee grinder. It's also worth keeping in mind that the price of the current coffee grinders tend to drop off when the next models are released. The biggest month in 2018 for new coffee grinder releases was September, with seven new coffee grinders released that month. In July 2017, five new coffee grinders were released making it the biggest month that year for new coffee grinder releases. In 2016 most new coffee grinders were released in September, with 35 new coffee grinders released that month.

How Fast Do Coffee Grinder Prices Drop After Release?

New coffee grinders drop in price by an average of 5% in the first 6 months after they wer first released. If you are prepared to wait then you could save an average of £3 on a typical £49 new coffee grinder by waiting 6 months before buying.

Coffee Beans Capacity

'Coffee Bean Capacity' denotes the amount of coffee beans that the grinder can hold at once time.

Across the range of coffee grinders, the coffee beans capacity range from 12g to 700g. The coffee beans capacity of most coffee grinders range from 10g to 70g. The coffee grinder with the biggest coffee beans capacity is the Swan SF16020N, which is a 700g capacity coffee grinder and is on sale for £22.92. The coffee grinder with the smallest coffee beans capacity is the Disino ds440269, which is a 12g capacity coffee grinder and is on sale for £14.89.

Grinding Mechanisms

'Grinding Mechanism' denotes the mechanism used to grind the coffee beans into fine particles.

Amongst new coffee grinders, the most common grinding mechanism is burr. We found 86 coffee grinders that are burr coffee grinders. We found 50 coffee grinders that are blade coffee grinders, making blade the second most popular grinding mechanism amongst new coffee grinders.

Adjustable Grinder Settings

'Adjustable Grinder Settings' denotes whether you can adjust the settings on the coffee grinder to produce finer or coarser grinds.

Most new coffee grinders are coffee grinders with an adjustable grinder settings. 88 coffee grinders (65%) on Kagoo are coffee grinders with an adjustable grinder settings.

Which Are the Cheapest Retailers for Coffee Grinders?

The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying coffee grinders. For each retailer it shows the total number of coffee grinders where they currently have a market leading price. The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying coffee grinders. For each retailer we took all of their prices and looked at what proportion of those prices where the cheapest on the market. The cheapest retailer that we found was eBay. 41 of their coffee grinder prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.

Proportion of Coffee Grinders for Which Each Retailer is Cheapest?

Assessing how cheap each retailer is for coffee grinders by counting the number of cheapest prices for that retailer, makes the retailers that offer the greatest number of coffee grinder prices more likely to offer the greatest number of cheapest prices. The chart below considers the proportion of each retailer's coffee grinder prices that are the cheapest compared to other retailers. The cheapest retailer that we found using this approach was eBay. 78.8% of their coffee grinder prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.