5.0 out of 5 stars Best Espresso Maker I’ve Used
I’ve had a few different espresso machines over the last decade, and have tried and returned a couple as well. This one is, by far, my favorite machine for several reasons. Throughout the review I will reference differences primarily with the Barista Express, as that is one that I had for some time as well.
The overall appearance of the machine looks good. I have the stainless steel version, and it looks sharp and well built. Breville is the only company I know that has the magnetic tamper holder underneath the top of the unit, and it’s a nice touch. A place to put the tamper, and always know where it is. Also, the tamper is a nice metal one, rather than the thin, light plastic many other brands use.
I also like that most, if not all, of what comes in contact with hot liquids is metal rather than plastic (though the portafilter does have some plastic, but I use a naked bottom portafilter as stated below). I kind of like the ease of the automatic machines that grind, tamp, and pull the shot, but the plastic group head makes me a bit uncomfortable. I try to minimize hot foods and liquids contacting plastic as much as possible. If plastic particles can leach out of water bottles, then heated plastics most likely will leach more.
As far as performance, I will touch on the grinder, pulling of the shots, hot water spout, and very importantly, the steam wand:
I have seen some complaints about Breville’s grinders, and I don’t understand why. Granted, I do believe that most of the complaints come from people who are much more advanced in their coffee preparation and understanding than I am. Nevertheless, I do find the grinder to do a good job. It has fine adjustments that you make with the dial on the left of the machine, plus larger scale adjustments that you can make with the grinder itself under where the bean hopper sits. I wouldn’t say the larger adjustments are super easy, but definitely doable if you follow the directions. I’ve made a single adjustment on the grinder itself and only rely on the fine adjustments other than that. As a side note, I saw on an instructional video by another reviewer that you want to make the fine adjustments while grinding to prevent getting anything stuck. I’m not sure if this is necessary but I do it just in case.
I am impressed by how little of a mess the grinding makes. The dosage amount and grind size is consistent once I dialed everything in and left it there. Plus it’s easy to switch from single to double dose.
Pulling shots is rather straight forward as well, but does take time getting things right. As far as getting it right, that’s more dependent on the size and dosing of the grinds as well as the tamping force, but you see the results during the shot pull. I don’t use the included portafilter because I’ve always liked the appearance of the naked bottom portafilters, so I found one on Amazon that’s sized for this machine. The naked bottom ones look cool pulling the shot, but make a bit more of a mess than the standard portafilter, and are a little less forgiving than the included one.
With a fairly good grind size and amount, you can get good consistent shots. With my Barista Express, I noticed that the second pull was usually more bitter and not as good tasting as the first shot, if pulled within a few minutes of each other. With this machine, I can pull a double shot, steam the milk, then pull another double shot without any issues or difference in taste. The Barista Pro also has the three second heat up time vs the thirty second or so on the Barista Express, which isn’t a huge deal itself but I believe the newer heating unit is more advanced and allows for the better second pull.
The hot water spout is angled and can dispense right into the cup after the shot is pulled without having to move the cup to a different location. Also, I like the angled spout versus the one on the Barista Express.
As far as the steam wand, it doesn’t seem like there is much advertised or discussed about the improvements of the steam wand versus the Barista Express, but in my opinion, it is far more powerful. I had a lot of difficulty getting the correct texture of milk for latte art, but with the Barista Pro, the steam wand seems much more powerful, faster to steam the milk, and can more easily achieve that proper texture and consistency for good latte art (my latte art isn’t very good, but I’m going to blame that on my skills rather than the steamer). For fairness, I will say that my skills have improved some since having the Barista Express, but I definitely feel a significant difference with this steam wand. Such that I feel that alone makes it worth the increased price compared to the Barista Express.
I have also tried an automatic machine. I would say that the automatic machines are easier to use, less of a learning curve (though there is still somewhat of a learning curve) and most give you the option to make a regular drip coffee as well. They don’t usually have as good a shot pull or taste as a unit like this one, and personally I like the “artsy” part of going from grind to shot manually.
To conclude, I would definitely recommend this machine to anybody who is looking for very good espresso drinks that are better than what you will usually find in coffee shops, at the comfort of your home. If you’re willing to learn how to use the steam wand well for lattes and cappuccinos, I feel this machine is better than the Barista Touch, and better than other machines in this price range. Within a few months, the machine pays for itself versus getting a latte a few times a week at a coffee shop.

5.0 out of 5 stars Well built and makes great espresso
5 star for sure. The machine is well built and great quality. I’m a big fan of Breville and own many of their products. It’s a great value also and not hard to use at all. Those that are lazy might disagree but I would rather take 5 minutes out of my morning to make my own espresso drink for just pennies compared to what coffee house’s charge for the same quality product. That’s not an exaggeration, it takes me literally 5 minutes for the whole espresso making process. That include grinding the coffee beans and steaming the milk, 5 minutes. You waist a lot longer driving to a coffee shop, waiting in line to order and waiting in line behind people also waiting on their coffee. Also, do the math, if you buy a coffee, just one coffee, for 5 or 6 dollars and that is a low end price at a coffee shop per day you can expect to spend $1,825 to $2,190 a year. A Barista Pro at 600 or 800 dollars, depending on if you catch them on sale, will pay for itself in a matter of months and my first machine lasted 7 years before the boiler gave in. That’s literally thousands of dollars saved not buying 1 cup of coffee per day at a coffee house and getting the same quality drink. I, with no doubt, will keep purchasing Breville espresso machines as long as they keep making the same quality machines at the reasonable prices they have now.

5.0 out of 5 stars Breville came thru in the end 🙂
I have had my Breville for 2.5 years and overall it has been a great experience. The machine is very easy to use – a beginner can make an excellent latte in minutes – but you can also play with various features to suit your particular espresso and latte style. I especially like how this machine heats up immediately – no waiting for coffee! Want it now? You got it! NEW feature – the small funnel that comes with it now keeps all the grounds in when. it comes out of the grinder so no mess – fabulous! How am I able to compare the new machine with the slightly older one? Well . . . I have been very happy with this machine . . until just recently – I cannot tell a lie – we had a rocky spell, Breville and I. But as they came thru for me I the end, I have raised my review back up to a 5. technically, due to the fact that it happened, perhaps I should have put a 4.5, but that isn’t possible. What happened was my machine just stopped working. I called support and the representative did a video chat with me to try to fix it on the spot. It was great that they could run me thru the different “fixit things” to try right over the phone, but eventually it became obvious that it needed something more than advanced cleaning. They were very prompt – they sent me a box to ship it in just like a day – super fast. A couple days later they then sent an e-mail with a quote and I decided to spend the money because I really really love this machine. It wasn’t cheap – but shipping was included so really not bad over all. And I wanted the professionals fixing it, not me trying this and that off of a DIY YouTube video and getting no where. So they fixed it and sent it back super fast – BUT – sadly, in their haste to get it back quickly to me, the technicians shipped it in a wet condition, and when it arrived it stunk and had rust marks on the face plate! Yikes. I was very very upset as it was not at all in that condition when I sent I to them. I had waited a couple days to send it and let the machine dry out on purpose. I can only think that it was an inexperienced technician who was trying to get it back to me super fast who made this mistake, and hopefully they are taking steps so this never happens to anyone else again! Initially they did not offer me any sort of compensation for this mistake – even tho having these blemishes was really upsetting and really spoiled the art factor of this machine – cause really – it is beautiful looking – it isn’t just an old coffee maker – it is a show piece in your home! I have mine proudly on display and serve coffee to all my guests! It looks fantastic on my counter! So when they did nothing for me I wrote my review detailing what had happened and lowered my rating to a 3. And then magically, someone at Breville either listened to what I told the representatives, or saw my review or I don’t know – but they suddenly did the right thing and approved a replacement machine! At no cost to me. I was ecstatic. Breville did right by me. It actually brings tears to my eyes cause I bought my original machine with money my Dad left me when he passed away. Otherwise it was really out of my price range. So thank you Breville – you warmed my heart and corrected your mistake and for that I give you 5 stars! You did the right and ethical thing. You can trust this company.

5.0 out of 5 stars An espresso machine perfect for beginners
This is a great beginner espresso machine. Very easy to use and maintain. We love it.

3.0 out of 5 stars Pretty Machine, Terrible Documentation and Support
So, the machine itself is very pretty with all its shiny stainless steel, and it is satisfyingly heavily built. The parts are well machined, and fit together well.

DOCUMENTATION:
The documentation, however, is terrible. There is one page of the manual (page 15) that contradicts itself just within that same page. It says that “if the espresso starts to flow after less than 6 seconds…this is an UNDER EXTRACTED shot.” Later on the same page, it says a correct extraction is when the “flow starts after 8-12 seconds”, and that under extraction is where “flow starts afer 1-7 seconds”. So, my extraction was starting to flow around 6 seconds, and sometimes 7, so according to the manual, that was both not under extracted and was under extracted. I wound up talking with a support person from Breville (I’ll get to that later), and I told her that the range of how much ground coffee should be used doesn’t actually work with the provided portafilter, and seems oddly high. When she asked me where I saw the range I was quoting, I told her (again, page 15), and she said it said something different, telling me I was wrong, followed by, “oh, you must have an outdated version of the manual that has the wrong numbers in it” even though I just purchased this a week ago. She emailed me the current manual. The provided manual says 8-10 grams for 1 cup, 19-22 grams for 2 cup. The PDF she emailed says 8-11 grams for 1 cup and 16-19 grams for 2 cup. These are really major mistakes that have made getting this to work properly into a nightmare that was unnecessary.

SUPPORT:
I spend an hour on the phone with a customer support woman from Breville. I’m going to recount some of the detailed dialogue so you can understand what this support experience was like for the hour of my life I will never get back.

She asked me no less than 4 times to grind a batch of coffee at 15 grind setting for 13 seconds, after I started off by telling her that when I did just that (the default), and it produced 21.4 grams of coffee, where only about 20 grams could be squeezed into in the portafilter, despite the manual saying that’s in range for what should fit. I kept telling her that again, and she would go back to it again and keep asking me to grind that much coffee despite my telling her that only 12 seconds worth could be squeezed into it. She also kept calling me “Mr. Hall”, which is not even vaguely close to my name, until I asked her why she was calling me that, so she switched to “Mr. Christopher” (my first name).

She had me run through the 1 and 2 shot cycles just to measure how much water comes out without a portafilter in place, which turned out to be almost 2 and almost 3 ounces, respectively. She then said, “Oh, that’s way too much, it should be 1 ounce and 2 ounces.”. I responded by saying, “isn’t that what the output should be of espresso when you actually pull it–since some water will be left within the grinds, etc.?”. She said, “no, it’s supposed to be 1 and 2 ounces without going through coffee and would be the same when it goes through coffee.” She then had me run though doing custom shot volume, telling me completely wrong information about how the procedure works, and had me change the amounts to 1 and 2 ounces of water. I did that–slightly more actually because water keeps coming out after you stop it. Then she had me pull shots through coffee. The single cup shot had a volume, including crema, of only 0.6 ounces! When I told her it was “point six ounces”, she said “that’s too much, it should only be an ounce”. When I responded again that it was “zero point six ounces” she said that again. When I said, “but that’s barely more than half of what it’s supposed to be, barely more than half an ounce”, she responded, “oh, right, that’s less than an ounce, I always get that backwards.”

I asked her if doing the “reset to defaults” on the machine would restore the volumes for shots that they machine came with, which seemed fine to me in the beginning. She said, “no, resetting to defaults does not affect that setting, you have to manually change it back using the custom setting.” After the call, where she left me with unusable settings and I was having a really tough time getting them right, I looked in the manual, and she was dead wrong. Doing a reset does reset these volumes, so I did.

At one point during the call, I had to tell her I needed to switch to a different coffee as I was almost out of the one I had just purchased (since she was making me waste massive amounts of it on totally useless tests). The beans I was using to this point, btw, were fairly good. It was Allegro Coffee Organic Espresso Bel Canto ( https://amzn.to/3eOOSnQ ). She said that the problem I actually called about–which was that I could not get the extraction into the correct time range of 8-12 seconds before flow starts, was entirely because I was using “inferior beans”.

OPERATION
I do love that this machine heats up in just a couple of seconds, whether for making espresso or for steaming milk. That’s an excellent feature. The steam wand is powerful too–though for small amounts of milk, it’s so powerful that it’s hard to get good microfoam and to not overheat the milk.

One design flaw is that when you grind the recommended amount of coffee into the portafilter (you put the portafilter and handle into a little slot), it spills coffee grounds everywhere–both wasting good coffee and making a mess that’s a pain to clean up each time.

I did find an excellent solution to that, which is to add in a ring funnel. I was skeptical about this, but with this on the portafilter, you leave it far belong the grinder and manually depress the button behind where the filter is supposed to go, and all the grinds get into the portafilter with no waste or mess. This means totally not using the grinder as intended, but the design for that is so broken that this is the only reasonable solution. The one I used was this, and it works shockingly well: https://amzn.to/38KwVmf

So, I’m not sure what to say about this machine in summary. It’s pretty and has some great features and engineering, but also some painfully badly engineered features. Documentation and technical support are among the worst of any company I’ve encountered. I so WANTED to love this machine. I like it, but there are a lot of issues to get past. I don’t have experience with other competing machines, so I don’t know what faults they have to compare with this. Between the design flaws, terrible support, and blatantly wrong information in their documentation that they provide, I would have to conclude that Breville is quite a dysfunctional company. Maybe I can live with that for a pretty machine with some nice features? I’m still trying to decide.