Compare the Best Coffee GrindersJuly 2018

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

The price range of coffee grinders is from $14 to $875 and in total we found prices for 61 coffee grinders. The average price of a new coffee grinder is $134 and the 80% of coffee grinders are priced between $20 and $348. The most expensive coffee grinder that we found is the Baratza Forte at $875, and the cheapest is the Bodum Bistro at only $14.

Coffee Grinder Brands - Price Range

The average price of Sage coffee grinders is $415 which is the highest average price of all coffee grinder brands. Sage coffee grinders range in price from $220 to $609.

The second highest average coffee grinder price out of all brands is Gastroback coffee grinders with an average price of $409. Gastroback coffee grinders start at $409 and their most expensive coffee grinder costs $409.

The average price of Rancillo coffee grinders is $370 which is the third highest average price of all coffee grinder brands. Rancillo coffee grinders start at $370 and their most expensive coffee grinder costs $370.

Coffee Grinder Brands - Average Ratings

We have analysed 15 expert reviews and 1,663 user reviews for coffee grinders available online and used this data to evaluate the average rating for each brand of coffee grinder.

Biggest Coffee Grinder Retailers

We found 40 current offers for coffee grinders from Amazon US making it the biggest coffee grinder retailer. That is slightly bigger than the second biggest retailer, eBay for whom we found 37 current offers for coffee grinders. The third biggest retailer is Overstock with 7 current coffee grinder offers.

When Are Most New Coffee Grinders Released?

Over the last 3 years we couldn't see any clear trend in the release month for new coffee grinders. In 2017 most new coffee grinders were released in September, with five new coffee grinders released that month. Also the biggest month in 2016 for new coffee grinder releases was September, with 35 new coffee grinders released that month. January was the biggest month in 2015 for new coffee grinders, with seven new coffee grinders released that month.

How Fast Do Coffee Grinder Prices Drop After Release?

On average, in the first 6 months after release, coffee grinders drop in price by 14%. On a typical new coffee grinder costing $70, by waiting 6 months before buying you could save on average $10.

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 currently retails for $0.00. The coffee grinder with the smallest coffee beans capacity is the Porlex Mini, which is a 20g capacity coffee grinder and is available at $59.12.

Grinding Mechanisms

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

We found 77 coffee grinders that are burr coffee grinders, which makes burr the most popular grinding mechanism amongst new coffee grinders. The second most frequently found grinding mechanism amongst new coffee grinders is blade. We found 40 coffee grinders that are blade 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.

The vast majority of the 117 new coffee grinders currently listed on Kagoo are coffee grinders with an adjustable grinder settings. 79 coffee grinders (68%) 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. 28 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. 75.7% of their coffee grinder prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.