What matters more than anything is burr set and burr alignment. Burr set will set taste profile. Alignment will define consistency. Everything else is diminishing returns. For most, Mazzer Philos and Zerno Z1 (and the upcoming Z2) will be pretty peak for premium home grinding. You can get similar for cheaper if you want to invest time to align the burrs manually. You can spend a ton more but won’t make your coffee much better.
Your grinder is the most important piece in your espresso system. The brewer is the least important. That is, if you are going for the taste and experience.
Decide if you want a grinder with a hopper or if you want single dose.
The Zerno Z1 or Z2 ($1,500 to $2,500), Kafatek M6 ($2,500), Lagom P80 ($1,800) are just a few very good single dose grinders to consider.
I’m at 600 rpm with the SSP Brewing burrs. The big adjustment I’ve made is no longer needing to do RDT. I find the finer I go, I still get amazing cups. It’s almost impossible to make bad coffee with these burrs, pour over on easy mode. I started at 6.5 on the dial and moved down to 5 and it’s all be great. Ignore the mixed info, some are spreading false info about this grinder and I would just flat out ignore them. Its a great grinder, that’s easy to use, clean, amazing work flow and quiet.
When it comes to 80mm grinders buy the one you like the most as if you have the same burrs in say a Weber EG-1 or a Z2 or a P80 it’s going to be very difficult to tell them apart. I never could when we did a big shoot out with the 64mm platform.
After looking around for a while, I bought the P80 last week. Definitely don't buy the P64, way older product and the P80 should be just an upgrade at a nearly identical cost, unless we're talking second hand market, but I'd probably still stick to the P80. I might've stretched my budget to buy the Zerno Z2 (or Z1) if I was in the US, but the P80 with the all inclusive shipping to EU made way more sense. Wasn't planning on spending that much, but saving a bit of money for a bigger purchase down the line is probably worth it, rather buy once cry once. If that budget just wasn't feasible, I'd say that the Lagom Casa or Mazzer Philos would be my main options depending on budget range. Niche Zero seems a bit "outdated" at this point, and also losses in value when having to export it outside of the UK. DF64 is just too "budget oriented" and unpolished even if it can be great for the price. The P80 definitely seems the most end game with 80mm blind burrs with minor cons/issues which are on par with the issues that people have on grinders twice the price and that fall on the "nothing is perfect" end of things.
P80 and Z2 will probably have similar performance. The burrs you choose will have a much bigger effect on the brew. Some people really prefer 98s but a lot of us like the 80 platform too.
I'd suggest doing some research on specific burrs before making a multiple thousand dollar purchase.
albertclee
