How to Choose the Right Entry-Level Coffee Grinder: Top Manual Coffee Grinder Brands Recommended

From the moment coffee powder is ground and exposed to air, it quietly begins to oxidize, and its flavor and aroma change accordingly. Therefore, the ideal situation is to grind coffee beans right before brewing to ensure you can enjoy the best flavor. A coffee grinder can be considered a seemingly humble yet extremely important role in the coffee brewing process, and it's one of the absolute indicators that affect the final flavor of your coffee!

When you search "coffee grinder" on online shopping platforms, you'll find price ranges from 22 yuan to 71,271 yuan—a difference of 3,239.6 times. While this may seem insignificant compared to the recent "billion" level numbers we've encountered, it's an outrageous price difference between products. That's why FrontStreet Coffee plans to publish an article on how to choose a coffee grinder for your reference.

FrontStreet Coffee isn't a gear enthusiast, so professional horizontal comparisons of coffee grinders aren't our specialty. However, FrontStreet Coffee has been in business for 8 years, has used seven or eight electric grinders, and has tried most of the popular manual grinders on the market. Below, we'll share some insights from our extensive experience with so many coffee grinders.

Manual Grinder or Electric Grinder?

Electric grinders overwhelmingly outperform manual grinders in terms of precision, durability, and price ceiling, while manual grinders have the advantage of being portable, electricity-free, and adaptable to various situations. When comparing manual and electric grinders at the same price point, manual grinders generally perform better. (A 1000 yuan manual grinder has significant advantages over a 1000 yuan electric grinder.)

FrontStreet Coffee has listed some groups of people who might be better suited for manual or electric grinders respectively. You can use this as a reference.

If you are:

• A student (living in a school dormitory)
• On a limited budget (under 1000 yuan)
• New to pour-over coffee and want to explore gradually
• Someone who frequents chain coffee shops and wants to improve coffee quality
• A fitness enthusiast
• A hiking enthusiast or frequent business traveler

Then we suggest you start with a manual grinder first, and consider an electric one later.

If you:

• Want to get it right the first time
• Have a permanent 200-square-meter space at home for coffee making
• Pursue speed and precision
• Have an ample budget (no upper limit)

Then you might as well go directly for an electric grinder.

If you are:

• A gear enthusiast collector
• A coffee fanatic

Then we suggest getting both.

How to Choose a Manual Grinder?

With the rise of domestic manual grinders, foreign grinders that cost over a thousand yuan can now be found in China for under 500 yuan. So how should you choose? We won't discuss manual grinders under 200 yuan, those with ceramic burrs, or retro-style manual grinders.

The remaining options can be roughly divided into the 200-499 yuan range, 500-799 yuan range, 800-999 yuan range, and 1000 yuan and above range.

The 200-499 yuan range is considered entry-level manual grinders that allow you to focus on coffee grind size. When buying, just make sure it has dual-axis construction, as they're basically similar in terms of lifespan, precision, and mechanics. Suitable for beginners and office workers to purchase.

The 500-799 yuan range is considered advanced manual grinders. Basically, each brand will use slightly better burrs, and there will be subtle improvements in bearings, significantly enhancing durability. We recommend choosing grinders with larger burr diameters, as grinding will be more effortless and uniform. Basically, if you buy a manual grinder in this price range and pay attention to regular cleaning, using it for two years won't be a problem.

The 800-999 yuan range is considered high-end manual grinders. Basically, there are only about 3 models to choose from. They mainly enhance the user experience and offer innovations in appearance (they look better). Of course, you can see improvements in the data charts provided by sellers (smartphone manufacturers would approve), but from FrontStreet Coffee's actual experience, when making coffee, you won't feel a significant difference compared to the advanced range.

The 1000 yuan and above range can be considered expert-level for now. You might ask FrontStreet Coffee why we don't categorize them into 1000-2000, 2000-3000 ranges? Because for anything over 2000 yuan, FrontStreet Coffee would suggest you go directly for an electric grinder to save trouble. Indeed, manual grinders above 1000 yuan come in various prices—1000 yuan, 2000 yuan, 4000 yuan, with a famous German manual grinder increasing from 1500 to 2500 yuan. Overall, the quality and experience will definitely have visibly noticeable improvements compared to those under 1000 yuan.

How to Choose an Electric Grinder?

FrontStreet Coffee particularly advises against buying those portable electric grinders. You can take note that grinders that determine grind size by time, commonly known as "choppers," have a structure similar to a blender with two blade pieces that randomly chop the beans.

One thing to pay attention to when buying an electric grinder is whether your need is for very fine espresso grinding or pour-over drip coffee grinding. The appearance and grinding range of these two types are very different, and basically, they cannot serve dual purposes (except for some all-purpose grinders).

If you have a budget of 20,000 yuan, you can freely choose between the Mazzer ZM filter and Mahlkönig EK 43. Besides their beautiful price and relatively large footprint, there are basically no reasons not to buy them.

Of course, most friends won't have too high a budget, probably within 4000 yuan. So what options are available? FrontStreet Coffee believes that the Royal Fuji and Fellow ODE are good choices. The Royal Fuji features ghost-tooth burrs as its selling point, and its grind size is quite suitable for pour-over-dominated drip grinding. The Fellow ODE is compact, pure black in color, nicknamed the "little black box," and scores full marks for appearance. Both grinders belong to the small electric grinder category, so they share a common drawback: relatively long grinding time.

Some friends have also asked FrontStreet Coffee whether the small Fuji grinders priced between 300-600 yuan on online shopping platforms are trustworthy. FrontStreet Coffee quickly took a look and found various styles of small Fuji, with text descriptions including terms like "small steel cannon," "defeated version," and "domestic small Fuji." Meanwhile, on an overseas online shopping platform, the small Fuji was seen at over 3300 RMB, which clearly indicates these are imitations of the Royal Fuji.

FrontStreet Coffee hasn't used these grinders, but we have used the Little Pony 610N, priced around 800-900 yuan. When comparing its grind with the small Fuji, the Little Pony lost in terms of precision, especially in the amount of fine powder, which was terrible to behold. One FrontStreet Coffee barista's experience: when using only the Little Pony, you won't notice any problems, but once you make a comparison, the difference becomes immediately apparent. As for how the 300-600 yuan "small Fuji" performs, FrontStreet Coffee cannot make an assessment.

There are also many electric grinders that are relatively inexpensive yet of good quality, but since FrontStreet Coffee hasn't used them, we won't elaborate on them one by one here.

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473