Manual vs Electric Coffee Grinders: Which is Best?

Buying a coffee grinder these days can seem like something of a minefield. An essential tool for producing fresh ground coffee at home, a good coffee grinder is an indispensable gadget nobody should be without.

Contrary to popular belief, it isn’t necessary to spend a fortune to produce the very best ground coffee at home. Nor are manual grinders ‘better’ or ‘worse’ than electric coffee grinders. 

Like most things, there are pros and cons on both sides of the fence. Some swear by traditional manual grinders, while others wouldn’t give up their electric grinders for all the money in the world.

With this in mind, we’ll now be taking a look at the primary points of appeal for both manual and automatic coffee grinders alike:

Manual Grinders

As the name suggests, a manual grinder relies on manual human energy to get the job done. You throw in the beans, turn the crank and crush them accordingly.  Thus producing fresh ground coffee of the highest quality in seconds. Manual grinders can be adjusted to produce course or fine coffee grounds as required - finer grounds taking a little more effort to produce than coarser grounds.

The obvious advantage of a manual grinder being its simplicity. You don’t need to worry about batteries or a power outlet, the whole thing is portable and it couldn’t be easier to use. It’s also less likely to malfunction than an electric grinder, due to its simplicity.

There are also those who revel in the process of manually producing fresh ground coffee. There’s definitely something satisfying about crunching quality coffee beans by hand, using a manual grinder. First of all, it’s perfectly possible to pick up an excellent manual coffee grinder that will probably serve you proudly for many years to come, such as the Comandante.

Electric Coffee Grinders

The biggest point of appeal with an electric coffee grinder is the elimination of all required effort. With powered devices, you simply throw the beans into the grinder and press a button. After which, the machine does the business on your behalf, producing fresh ground coffee in a matter of seconds.

In terms of speed and convenience, electric coffee grinders score top marks.  They can also be surprisingly compact and comprehensively easy to use. Prices range from the sublime to the ridiculous, as do adjustable grinding modes and settings. Incredibly, there are some top-end devices on the market with more than 40 settings to choose from. If you’re all about pinpoint precision, a quality electric grinder like the Mahlkönig Vario Home can be right up your street.

The only slight downside with electric coffee grinders being that if you’re out of power, you’re out of luck. Not that this is usually an issue, but is still worth bearing in mind.

A Question of Quality…

Grinding and brewing the best ground coffee at home is all about quality.  Whether you go the DIY or electric route is largely inconsequential. Just as long as the device you choose has been tried, tested and approved by those in the know, you won’t go far wrong.

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* Nespresso® is a registered trademark of Société des Produits Nestlé S.A., unrelated to Hayman®. Our espresso pods are not created or sold by Nespresso®.

** Keurig and K-Cup are registered trademarks of Keurig Green Mountain, Inc. unrelated to Hayman®. Our pods are not created or sold by Keurig®.