Coffee Beans
Quality coffee starts with the right coffee beans
Coffee Drinks
Know your coffee and brew like an expert barista
Gear Guides
Make coffee like a pro with the best equipment
The 4 Types of Coffee Bean
Arabica, Robusta, Liberica, Excelsa… they’re all types of coffee beans, but they each have a completely different taste.
Improve your coffee knowledge with our guide to the four types of coffee beans.
Types of Coffee
Is americano the same as black coffee? What’s the difference between a latte and a cappuccino?
Learn the different types of coffee and how to make them.
Does the Type of Coffee Grinder Make a Difference?
The short answer is yes: The type of coffee grinder you use will make a huge difference to the taste and quality of your cup of coffee.
Fortunately, we’re here to help you find the best coffee grinder for you.
Coffee Articles
Explore different types of coffees and coffee beans, discover the best coffee-making equipment, and learn to make a better brew.
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Best Coffee Beans for Pour Over
Pour-over rewards light-to-medium roast, single-origin beans — the method’s slower, controlled extraction highlights bright acidity and nuanced flavor notes that get muddied in darker roasts or blends. The paper filter strips oils and sediment that would otherwise round things out, so the bean itself becomes the dominant flavor signal. This completes the bean pairing for…
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Best Manual Coffee Grinder
A good manual coffee grinder can match or beat a cheap electric grinder’s consistency, needs no outlet, and is quiet enough to use before anyone else is awake. The tradeoff is effort and speed — hand-cranking a dose takes 30 to 90 seconds, and capacity tops out around 20-40g, so it’s built for one or…
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What Is a Doppio Espresso
A doppio is simply the Italian word for a double shot of espresso — roughly 2oz (60ml) pulled from 14-18g of ground coffee, using a double portafilter basket. It’s not a different drink or a more concentrated one; it’s the same espresso ratio as a single shot, just doubled in size.
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Cafe au Lait vs Latte
A café au lait is drip coffee mixed with hot milk in roughly equal parts, while a latte is espresso topped with steamed milk and a thin layer of foam. The coffee base is the real difference — one uses brewed coffee, the other uses espresso — and that changes the ratio, texture, and caffeine…
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How to Descale an Espresso Machine
Descaling removes mineral buildup from your espresso machine’s boiler and internal lines; cleaning removes coffee oil and grounds residue from the group head and portafilter. They’re not the same task, and doing one doesn’t substitute for the other — you need both, on different schedules. This guide covers how often to actually descale, whether vinegar…
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Best Budget Espresso Machine
You don’t need to spend $500 to pull a real shot of espresso at home. A handful of pump and manual machines in the $100–200 range use genuine 9-bar-capable pumps or lever mechanisms and can produce real, crema-topped espresso — the tradeoffs versus a $500+ machine are build durability and temperature stability under heavy use,…
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Protein Coffee
Protein coffee (sometimes called “proffee”) is coffee blended with protein powder, usually with milk and ice, combining caffeine’s alertness with protein’s staying power. Done wrong, it turns into a clumpy, grainy mess — but the fix is simple once you know why it happens.
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Vietnamese Coffee
Vietnamese coffee is built around three things: robusta beans, a slow metal drip filter called a phin, and sweetened condensed milk instead of dairy and sugar. The result is a small, intensely strong, syrupy-sweet cup that’s brewed differently from almost any other coffee tradition. We’ve covered another Old World brewing style in Arabic vs. Turkish…
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How to Make a Frappuccino
A frappuccino is a blended, ice-based coffee drink — coffee (or a non-coffee “crème” base), milk, ice, and flavoring blended until slushy, then topped with whipped cream. We’ve already covered how a frappuccino compares to a cappuccino in that guide; this one is the full how-to, including the actual ingredient that gives it that signature…
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Vanilla Sweet Cream Cold Brew
Vanilla sweet cream cold brew is cold brew concentrate topped with a hand-whipped mix of heavy cream, 2% milk, and vanilla syrup poured over ice — no stirring, so the cream cascades through the coffee rather than blending flat. It’s one of Starbucks’ most-ordered cold drinks, and it’s simple enough to build at home once…
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Nitro Cold Brew vs Cold Brew
Nitro cold brew is regular cold brew concentrate infused with nitrogen gas, which creates a creamy, cascading texture without any added dairy or sugar. Regular cold brew is thinner and brighter, served over ice. The nitrogen itself adds zero caffeine — any caffeine difference between the two comes down to how concentrated the base coffee…
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Dalgona Coffee
Dalgona coffee is instant coffee, sugar, and hot water whipped in equal parts until it turns into a thick, stiff-peaked foam, then spooned over milk. It gets its name from its visual resemblance to dalgona, a Korean sugar-and-baking-soda honeycomb candy — the drink itself has no candy in it. It went viral worldwide in 2020…
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Pumpkin Spice Latte
A pumpkin spice latte (PSL) is an espresso drink flavored with pumpkin spice syrup and steamed milk, topped with whipped cream and a dusting of cinnamon or nutmeg. Despite the name, the flavor comes from warm baking spices — cinnamon, ginger, clove, and nutmeg — the same blend used in pumpkin pie, which is why…
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Iced Chai Latte
An iced chai latte is spiced black tea concentrate mixed with cold milk and served over ice — it contains no coffee or espresso. The caffeine comes entirely from the black tea base, which is why it’s noticeably gentler than a coffee drink. If you want the tea flavor with a caffeine kick added, that’s…
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How to Make Iced Coffee (4 Methods, Any Equipment)
Iced coffee is not just cold coffee. Done right, it’s balanced, smooth, and doesn’t taste watered down. Done wrong, it’s a lukewarm, diluted cup that tastes bitter once it cools. The difference comes down to method and a few simple decisions: how you brew, how much ice you use, and what you sweeten it with.…
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Best Coffee Maker with Grinder
A coffee maker with a built-in grinder solves two things at once: you get freshly ground beans for every brew without the extra counter space, extra cost, or extra step of a separate grinder. The downside is that the grinders in these machines are almost always a compromise — they’re not as adjustable or as…
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Irish Coffee Recipe
Irish coffee is simpler than it looks. Hot strong coffee, Irish whiskey, a little brown sugar, and cold cream floated on top so the coffee passes through it as you drink. The cream is the trick — it needs to be just thick enough to sit on the coffee without mixing in. Get that right,…
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Espresso Martini Recipe
An espresso martini is one of the few cocktails that genuinely tastes like great coffee. Two shots of fresh espresso, vodka, and coffee liqueur, shaken hard with ice — then strained into a chilled glass where the foam settles into a thick, crema-like head. It’s rich, bitter-sweet, and caffeinated. Below is the classic recipe, the…
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How to Clean a Keurig Coffee Maker (Step-by-Step Guide)
Your Keurig coffee maker is a workhorse, but it quietly accumulates calcium deposits, coffee oils, and bacteria with every brew. Left unchecked, this buildup slows the machine down, mutes the flavor of your coffee, and shortens its lifespan. The good news: a proper clean takes around 30 minutes and you probably already have everything you…
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Brown Sugar Oat Milk Shaken Espresso
The brown sugar oat milk shaken espresso became a Starbucks staple for a reason — it hits every note at once: bold espresso, caramel-like brown sugar sweetness, a hint of cinnamon, and the creamy creaminess of oat milk. The shaking technique is what makes it: vigorous shaking over ice chills and slightly dilutes the espresso…
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Iced Matcha Latte Recipe
An iced matcha latte is one of the simplest things you can make at home — matcha powder, cold milk, ice, and a good whisk. The version most people are searching for is the Starbucks iced matcha latte, which uses a sweetened matcha blend. This guide covers both: the homemade version you can make in…
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White Chocolate Mocha Recipe
A white chocolate mocha is what happens when espresso meets white chocolate sauce and steamed milk — it’s rich, sweet, and creamy in a way that regular mochas aren’t. The white chocolate adds vanilla and cocoa butter notes rather than the darker, slightly bitter edge of a standard mocha. Below you’ll find the full recipe…
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Best Espresso Machine with Built-in Grinder
A built-in grinder is the single biggest upgrade you can make to your espresso setup. Fresh-ground coffee goes stale within minutes — by the time pre-ground coffee reaches your portafilter, the volatiles responsible for crema, sweetness, and clarity have largely evaporated. The machines below grind, dose, and brew from whole beans in a single workflow.…
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Macchiato vs Cappuccino vs Latte: The Differences Explained
The difference between a macchiato, a cappuccino, and a latte is how much milk and foam you add to the same shot of espresso. A macchiato is espresso with just a dollop of foam (smallest and strongest), a cappuccino is equal parts espresso, steamed milk, and thick foam (balanced), and a latte is espresso with…