.jpg "How to Layer Your Clothes to Stay Warm in Any Season (2026)")
Compare Our Top 5 Grinders
Best Budget Coffee Grinders
As mentioned above, the best bang for your buck will always be a hand grinder like my favorite, the Kingrinder K6 manual coffee grinder ($100). A precisely machined manual coffee grinder can rival coffee grinders many hundreds of dollars more expensive, both in precision and durability. And so the best manual coffee grinder will also be the budget option that’ll lead to the best coffee. I’ve personally come to love the routine, and the control.
But I get it. You’ll happily grind your pepper with the best pepper grinder, but you draw the line at grinding coffee. Mornings are hard. Electricity helps. These are the budgetiest of budget electric coffee grinder options for each style of brew, all blessedly hands-off. None of these will lead to the clarity of flavors or sweetness or delicacy of our top picks. But they’re the absolute lowest-cost devices we recommend for each category of brew.
Best Budget Coffee Grinder for Drip Coffee
Just when you thought Oxo had already cornered the market on affordable conical burr coffee grinders, they came in at an even lower price with this compact model. This lower-cost compact Oxo Brew is stacked like a wee layer cake. And so the grind cup is housed within the column of the device itself, and can be pulled out when you’re done grinding. But while this is quite clever, neither consistency of grind nor ease of use is quite on par with Oxo’s $110 basic conical burr, which remains my pick for an entry-level coffee grinder. But it’s also very easy to move from the cabinet to the counter, and $30 less is $30 less. This is the lowest-price electric grinder I could actually recommend for Aeropress, drip, pour-over, French press, or cold brew. I wouldn’t attempt espresso, though.
Best Budget Coffee Grinder for Espresso
Photograph: Matthew Korfhage
WIRED
- Portable and affordable
- Grind range encompasses everything from espresso to cold brew
- Stepless adjustment for precise fine-tuning
TIRED
- Grinds slow, at low rpms
- Still not as tasty as top espresso or drip picks
I’m continuing to test this, but for the moment, the lowest-cost electric espresso-capable grinder I can recommend with a clean conscience is the Wirsh Geimori T38 Plus for $130. This portable conical-burr grinder is about the size of a Christmas nutcracker, and looks alarmingly ike Pinocchio’s left leg. But it offers surprisingly low coffee retention, stepless grind adjustments, and far better precision than expected for a grinder of its price. It achieves this by grinding at low rpms—meaning it grinds quite slowly and carefully for an electric grinder. This also means the T38 Plus takes more than 30 seconds to grind enough beans for a double shot of espresso. This is disqualifiyingly slow for batches large enough for drip or French press, and the T38 doesn’t really have the clarity you want for pour-over. Still, it might be the only electric grinder I’ve tested south of $150 that can make decent espresso on non-pressurized baskets. It’s also wee, and great for small kitchens or as a travel coffee grinder. It’s the grinder I’d definitely take with me to a hotel room if I didn’t feel like grinding coffee by hand.
Best Coffee Grinder for $50 or Less
KitchenAid
Blade Coffee Grinder
WIRED
- Very cheap
- Very small
- Simple and durable
TIRED
- Choppy grind, with too many boulders
- Only marginal improvement over pre-ground coffee
- Bad for light roasts
Look, blade grinders like this KitchenAid won’t offer the powdery fineness and full-bodied coffee pleasures of a great conical burr, nor the precision of WIRED’s top flat burr pick. Blade grinders chop the heck out of beans, offering an uneven grind. But this is a very affordable coffee grinder, it’s simple as pancakes to use, and blade-ground fresh beans are still a little better than the stuff in the supermarket. That said, they’re probably still worse than getting beans fresh-grounda t a cafe and using them within a week. When non-bean-geek friends ask for a grinder that costs less than dinner for two at Arby’s, this is the one I offer up—especially if they’re using darker grinds, and favor French press or a less expressive drip coffee maker. At the very least, it’s enough so you’re not crippled when you get whole-bean coffee as a gift. But let’s be clear. The $75 Oxo Compact burr grinder above is about five times as good for $25 more.
Results of Particle Size Analysis of Coffee Grinders
Photograph: Matthew Korfhage
I of course assessed coffee grinders by tasting the resulting coffee, across a number of brew styles and beans. But I also backed up my taste buds with scientific instruments. I analyze the flavor profile and the grind consistency of each of WIRED’s top burr coffee grinder picks using particle analysis by a device called the DiFluid Omni. You can read a broader discussion of that particle analysis here.
Specifically, I tested each of WIRED’s top burr grinders on multiple grind settings using the same medium-grind coffee beans — at both espresso-fine grinds and medium grinds more suitable for drip or pourover coffee. Since September 2025, I also test every grinder I review or consider as a tip pick, including the Moccamaster KM5, whose results are included here. I tested at least 5 times for each grind sample, collating the results into a chracteristic curve for that bean and grinder.
Expand the discussion below for detailed discussion, and bar graphs and such.
Particle Size Analysis of Top Coffee Grinder Picks
Particle size analysis of coffee grinds is not a cut-and-dried test: It’s more a clue as the the probable character of a brew. Patterns begin to emerge that correlate to the experiences I’ve had tasting coffee from each grinder. Taste is the ultimate test, alongside consistency of finicky espresso pulls. But quantitative analysis helps me (and you) actually trust and maybe understand those sensory test results.
When looking at these bar graph curves below, there are also a few rules of thumb. Big boulders north of a thousand microns will often lead to muddier character. Too many fines below 100 microns might lead to bitterness. A tight particle size distribution is associated with greater clarity of flavor. Look at the standard deviation (SD) for a clue as to overall precision: Smaller numbers indicate likely greater clairty. This said,a broad distribution of coffee ground sizes can also lead to better body, and more perceived sweetness.
Our top pick for most people, the Baratza Encore ESP, proved itself to have quite precise results at very fine grinds—with standard deviation below 200 microns on espresso grinds, and 30 percent of particles concentrated within a single range. At its price range, this is admirable precision matched by very few grinders.
Courtesy of Matthew Korfhage
The same wasn’t as true at pour-over coffee settings for the Baratza Encore ESP (seen here at setting 22), which showed a broader and more heterogeneous particle size distribution—with both small and large particle sizes. In practice, this led to a full-bodied and rounder cup, but with a little bit less of the precise aromatics one can get from our favorite grinder for drip, the Fellow Ode Gen 2.
Courtesy of Matthew Korfhage
The Ode showed a characteristic Bell-curve shape, surrounding a single high peak, which corresponded with the precise aromatics I taste when brewing drip or pour-over coffee using the Ode.
Even greater precision was on display with the Technivorm Moccamaster KM5, a flat burr grinder that showed precise results across the board—rivaling the Encore ESP at fine grinds and the Ode Gen 2 at grinding for drip. It’s not as user-friendly as some of the top-pick devices, and the resulting brews can sometimes feel clinically clean, with a thinner body. But my lord it does offer clarity.
Courtesy of Matthew Korfhage
The Kingrinder K6 hand grinder, our top manual grinder pick,, also showed strong peaks at grind sizes appropriate for pour-over coffee. Shown here are analyses of two medium-fine grinds, at 60 and 70 clicks from zero, respectively. Hand grinders have a secret weapon, which is that they cause you to grind slowly—which works very well at coaxing out more clarity from conical burrs. For pour-over grinds, the Kingrinder showed a higher peak than basically any grinder I tested, meaning grinds are very concentrated in a tight range of sizes: as many as 40 percent of coffee grounds were functionaly the same size, and about 70 percent were grouped tightly around this. This leads to quite pronounced, intense flavor notes.
Courtesy of Matthew Korfhage
At grind sizes suitable for espresso, the Mazzer Philos bests this precision, with more than 90 percent of coffee grounds huddled in a tight grouping while using the i200D burr set. Nonetheless, while boulders are all but nonxistent, enough coffee fines exist to give each shot an almost syrupy consistency. The result is both body and perceived sweetness, with a surprisingly delicate clarity. While I haven’t tested the i189D burrs also available as an option, reports from the world say that the 189Ds lean even harder into clarity of flavors. But note that at bigger grind sizes more suitable for drip coffee, you’ll get a quite broad distribution. This will lead to a well-rounded cup, but may not offer the clarity of flavor of the Fellow Ode Gen 2 or the Kingrinder K6 for drip and pour-over brews.
Omni via Matthew Korfhage
Omni via Matthew Korfhage
Frequently Asked Questions
How We Test Coffee Grinders
WIRED tests coffee grinders by grinding a lot of beans, and making a lot of coffee—testing each grinder to see if it can serve well for espresso, Aeropress, drip or pour-over coffee, and coarse-ground cold brew and French Press. I tend to always grind a drip Stumptown Homestead or Single-Origin Colombia as a baseline, because each is readily available at my local supermarket with stamped roast dates, and because I know the flavor well enough I can detect variations. But I’ll also try out a number of flavors and roasts on each grinder, for different brewing methods.
Photograph: Matthew Korfhage
We assess each grinder for decibel level while grinding, ease of cleaning and operation, hopper design, the presence or absence of “popcorning” (where the beans pop around inside the hopper, often leading to more uneven results), messiness and static electrical buildup, grind retention, ease of use, value, and simple aesthetics.
Previous WIRED reviewers assessed grind uniformity visually with the aid of macro lenses, or filtered coffee grounds with sieves. In the most recent round of testing, I re-assessed each top coffee grinder pick using particle grind size analysis, with the help of the DiFluid Omni roast color and particle size analyzer, as well as a data analysis app that’s still in beta testing.
I tested both fine and medium grinds on each grinder, using the same beans for each grinder, roasted within a month of testing. I repeated the particle analysis at least five times for each grinder and setting. I assessed the uniformity of the grind and the overall distribution of particle sizes—paying particular attention to the share of coffee fines (the tiniest particles smaller than 100 microns) and boulders (big coffee bits larger than 1000 microns).
Why Grind Whole Beans Instead of Buying Pre-Ground?
The reasons are simple: Flavor. Freshness. Aroma.
Whenever you open a vacuum-sealed bag of beans, a little invisible clock starts. Oxidation begins to erode the character of your beans, breaking down organic compounds and degrading them, turning your lovely beans to cardboard. Aromatic flavor compounds also escape from the bean, gassing out into the air where they do no particular good.
When you grind your beans, these processes goes into overdrive. Freshness for whole beans can be measured in weeks. For ground beans, freshness in the open air is a matter of hours or even minutes. That bag of pre-ground beans you got from the supermarket? It’s still coffee, of course, and it’ll taste like coffee. But the vibrancy is gone. As far as true freshness is concerned, that coffee’s been dead for weeks. (Pre-ground beans can be kept airtight for a week or so and maintain their flavor, if you get them ground fresh at a coffee roaster.)
Photograph: Matthew Korfhage
The only reliable way to get truly excellent flavor from your coffee beans, the way you experience it at a café, is to use fresh, whole beans. This is also how you can exercise some control over extraction, and dial in your brewer or espresso maker to get the pefect results for each bean.
Espresso requires a fine grind, pour-over a little coarser, electric drip coffee a little coarser than this. Each grinder should have a guide to the best adjustments for each brewing method. Lighter-roast beans will want a finer grind than dark-roast, to aid in extraction: porous dark-roast beans give up their secrets a lot easier.
It’s all kinda fun to figure out, if you let it be fun. But certainly, when you strike paydirt, you’ll know it: Finding the right marriage of grind and bean, on a good grinder, can turn into the best cup you’ve ever had. It’s like the magical first time you seared a perfect steak, or baked a perfect layer cake. Effort meets reward. It’s marvelous. The grinders in this guide will help you find that moment more often.
What Is a Conical, Flat, or Blade Grinder?
Honorable Mentions and Runners-Up
Also Tested
Photograph: Matthew Korfhage
Wirsh Geimori GU38 for $200: The GU38 grinder from Wirsh/Geimori uses an identical burr set to the T38 Plus model I recommend as a budget espresso grinder. It’s also bulkier, and built a little sturdier. But the angled hopper causes more coffee retention, including some coffee beans that just refuse to feed into the grinder. Performance also seems slightly less reliable than the TU38, perhaps because the GU38 grinds faster. Either way, I’d opt for the lower-cost T38 Plus over this quite similar model.
Aarke Flat-Burr Grinder for $400: This pretty, shiny, stainless steel Aarke grinder contains a unique feature when paired with Aarke’s coffee brewer, detecting the water in the brewer’s tank and grinding the appropriate amount of beans. But this feature wasn’t as calibrated as we’d like, and there have been a lot of online reports of grinder jams. I didn’t have the same problem, but at more than $300 for a grinder that hasn’t been long on the market, prudence is often rewarded.
Hario Skerton Pro for $55: The Hario Skerton was the gateway hand grinder for many a coffee nerd, but it has since given ground to newer entrants. It’s fast and cheap, but it’ll give you a heck of a workout and isn’t as consistent for coarse grinds, plus the silicone handle has a habit of falling off.
Courtesy of Amazon
Hario Mini-Slim Plus for $39: This smaller Hario manual grinder is slower than the Skerton, but its plastic construction makes it good to throw in a travel bag. The low price is its main advertisement.
Cuisinart Burr Grinder for $75: At first, it seems like a good deal. It’s Cuisinart, a known brand, and a conical burr grinder for less than $100! But former WIRED reviewer Jaina Grey found that the low price came with a cost: These things apparently burn out faster than a rock star in the late ’60s.
Bodum Bistro Electric Blade Grinder for $20: This little blade grinder is quite cheap, and the model has served WIRED contributing reviewer Tyler Shane for years. That said, after some inconsistent reports on reliability, we favor the KitchenAid as our ultra-budget pick.
DmofwHi Cordless Grinder for $40: We used to recommend this cordless blade grinder for camping, largely because it can make 15 pots of French press without need of a recharge. It’s out of stock as of February 2026, and we’re monitoring to see whether it returns.
Power up with unlimited access to WIRED. Get best-in-class reporting that’s too important to ignore. Subscribe Today.
