If you rely on a cup of coffee to kickstart your morning, you’re in good company – coffee is now the most consumed drink in Britain according to a 2024 global survey by Statista, knocking the stereotypically British cup of tea down into second place.
Whether you reach for an artisanal pour-over or a cafetière cup, no one wants to wake up to the terrifying realisation that they have no coffee. Thankfully, with the recent rise of outstanding roasteries across the UK, finding your perfect brew has never been easier.
We tested 23 types of coffee bean and have selected our top nine below, measuring each coffee against four main flavour categories: sweetness, acidity, bitterness and balance. Because artisan bean production can have a quick turnover, some of these blends will only be in stock temporarily, but we’ve recommended the roasteries, too.
For more on coffee, we’ve reviewed the best bean-to-cup coffee machines, espresso machines, coffee pod machines, filter coffee machines, iced coffee makers, cafetières, coffee grinders, milk frothers and reusable coffee cups. Plus, read our guide to picking the best coffee machine for your budget.
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Best coffee beans to buy at a glance
- Best supermarket coffee beans: Grind – house blend, from £9.95
- Best coffee bean blend: Kiss the Hippo – George Street blend, from £12
- Best coffee beans for French press: Pact Coffee – house blend, from £11.19
- Best coffee beans for latte: Origin Coffee Roasters – Resolute, from £10.65
- Best medium-roast coffee beans: Rounton – Granary blend, from £9.75
- Best coffee beans for espresso: Assembly Coffee – house espresso, from £11
- Best organic coffee beans: Owens – Coast blend, from £8.95
- Best all-rounder coffee beans: Volcano Coffee Works – Mount blend, from £9
- Best coffee beans for coffee aficionados: Square Mile – Red Brick blend, £14.50
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How we tested coffee beans
Sweetness: Coffee contains naturally occurring sugars that are brought out by the roasting process. While some beans have higher concentrations than others, the roaster is typically responsible for the sweetness in a cup. We looked for coffees with plenty of sugary notes and coffees with more unusual types of sweetness, which scored higher than those with more common features.
Acidity: Most of us underestimate the importance of acidity in coffee but the level of acid signifies where a coffee is from, how it was processed and even at what altitude it was grown. Acidity, like sweetness, can range from simple to complex. We scored coffees with more complex or enjoyable forms of acidity higher in our blind taste test.
Bitterness: When coffee is roasted, some of its inherent bitterness is diminished, making it more palatable for human consumption. However, if roasted too dark, the roasting itself produces bitter flavours, most of which we perceive as unpleasant. We looked for coffees with a low-to-medium bitterness, and with no acrid or carbonic notes.
Balance: Much of what defines our favourite coffee experiences depends on our personal preferences. However, balance is a way of determining objective overall flavour. In our blind taste test, we defined balance as harmony across the three flavour categories. Combined with a good roast profile, these flavours work together to create a balanced cup.
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Best coffee beans to buy online in 2025
Grind coffee beans – house blend
Available from Grind – 227g (from £9.95), Waitrose – 200g (£5), Tesco – 200g (£5.95), Amazon – 1kg (£29.95)
Best supermarket coffee beans
Coffee type: blend
Sourcing details of coffee tested: Brazil, Colombia
Flavour notes: dark chocolate, almond, cherry, caramel
Recommended brew methods: pour-over, Aeropress, cafetière, moka pot, espresso
With 14 locations in London, including cafés, coffee shops and trucks, you can also find Grind whole coffee beans, grounds and coffee pods in most major UK supermarkets like Waitrose and Tesco.
The brand’s house blend is as simple and classy as it gets, and comes in a reusable pale pink tin that can be refilled at any of its locations. The coffee itself has an emphasis on big, sweet notes, with just enough acidity to keep things interesting.
With a medium roast, this will satisfy a range of coffee drinkers, as it doesn’t have the bitter or carbonic notes that we tasted in other house blends. We found it to be a solid all-rounder, performing well across different brew types and looking great while doing it.
Available from:
Kiss the Hippo – George Street Blend
Available from Kiss the Hippo (from £12)
Best coffee bean blend
Coffee type: blend
Sourcing details of coffee tested: Rwanda, Colombia, Peru
Flavour notes: chocolate, berries, butterscotch
Recommended brew methods: pour-over, Aeropress, espresso
Kiss the Hippo was launched in 2018, but assembling a team of professionals with impressive coffee credentials has already helped it rocket to the top of many coffee lovers’ lists.
Its house blends are a great place to start, with its George Street blend (named after its George Street location in Richmond) being a popular favourite. It has a classic coffee profile with sweet, chocolatey notes and a smooth, full body – good as a pour-over, but even greater as an espresso.
We’ve also previously tested the classic Donna Blend, a darker roast sourced from Uganda and Brazil, which has notes of caramel, dark chocolate and walnut – perfect for a cafetière or moka pot.
Available from:
Pact Coffee – house blend
Available from Pact Coffee (from £11.19)
Best coffee beans for French press
Coffee type: blend
Sourcing details of coffee tested: multiple locations (not specified)
Flavour notes: milk chocolate, toffee
Recommended brew method: moka pot, French press/cafetière
Pact Coffee has been running since 2012 and has become one of the most visible coffee subscription services in the UK. It’s achieved B-Corp company status – its coffee bags can be recycled and it also offers coffee in recyclable aluminium pods designed to be compatible with coffee pod systems.
We enjoyed the House Coffee dark roast blend, which is sourced from multiple coffee farms and roasted at Pact Coffee’s HQ in Haslemere. This particular batch is smooth and sweet, with a hit of caramel at the front of the mouth from the first sip. As it’s low in acidity, it worked especially well with brewing methods that require longer contact time, such as cafetière/French press or moka pot.
Available from:
Origin Coffee Roasters – Resolute blend
Available from Origin Coffee (from £10.65 for 250g)
Best coffee beans for latte
Coffee type: blend
Sourcing details of coffee tested: Colombia, Nicaragua
Flavour notes: stone fruit, caramel, milk chocolate
Recommended brew method: espresso, pour-over, Aeropress, cafetière
From Cornwall to the bustling streets of Shoreditch, Origin Coffee has made a name for itself. Taking top awards in many of the UK’s coffee competitions, the team at Origin is made up of some of the country’s most well-respected baristas, roasters and wholesalers.
We tasted Origin’s Resolute beans, a medium-roast blend from Huila, Colombia and Jinotega, Nicaragua. Huila is a region known for producing bright, acidic coffee with fruit notes, while beans from Jinotega have a creamier profile reminiscent of chocolate, raisins and vanilla. Together, this makes for a dynamic, complex brew that sings in a latte, but works perfectly as a pour-over, too.
Available from:
Rounton Coffee Roasters – Granary blend
Available from Rounton Coffee Roasters – 250g (from £9.75), Amazon – 1kg (from £31.50)
Best medium-roast coffee beans
Coffee type: blend
Sourcing details of coffee tested: Brazil, El Salvador, Uganda
Flavour notes: chocolate, hazelnut, caramel
Recommended brew method: pour-over, cafetière/French press
North Yorkshire-based Rounton is working through a road map to sustainability. So far, its coffee bags are carbon neutral and fully recyclable, and it’s involved with long-term projects designed to help the communities that grow its coffee, like Agri Evolve’s ACE 2023 project, which supports farmers in Uganda.
Rounton’s Granary blend is named after the building in which the roaster is located and we thought it was a solid all-rounder with a nutty, chocolate base and smooth yet bold finish. It pairs well with milk but to appreciate its full complexity we recommend enjoying it black as a French press or pour-over.
Available from:
Assembly Coffee – house espresso
Available from Assembly Coffee (from £11)
Best coffee beans for espresso
Coffee type: single origin
Sourcing details of coffee tested: Risaralda, Colombia
Flavour notes: plum, brown sugar
Recommended brew method: espresso, moka pot, Aeropress
Brixton-based Assembly Roastery was founded in 2015 with a focus on quality, insights and innovation in the coffee industry. Passionate about premium coffee, you’ll find some very rare and exclusive coffee on its site.
It goes into great detail in the descriptions for each offering, so if you feel about coffee the way a sommelier does about wine, this brand will really appeal. As an example of its passion for premium coffee, the head roaster Claire Wallace won the 2022 United Kingdom Barista Championship before heading to the World Barista Championships in the same year, where she came third in the final.
For tasting, we enjoyed the house espresso from Risaralda, Caldas – one of Colombia’s most prolific coffee regions. We loved this coffee as an espresso, where its rich, full-bodied profile combined with sweet, syrupy notes of stone fruits and brown sugar – making for a perfectly balanced cup.
Available from:
Owens Organic Coffee – Coast blend
Available from Owens Coffee (from £8.95)
Best organic coffee beans
Coffee type: arabica and robusta blend
Sourcing details of coffee tested: Honduras
Flavour notes: chocolate, cherry and clove
Recommended brew method: moka pot, cafetière, espresso
Based in Devon, Owens was the first organic coffee roaster in the South West and has been roasting coffee beans since 2010. Sustainability is a huge focus for the business – all of the beans are organically grown via Fairtrade practices and its coffee bags can be recycled in the plastic recycling facilities usually found in most supermarkets. Owens also uses a high-tech smoke-free roaster, which is powered by 80% less energy than traditional roasters.
There’s a range of whole beans, pre-ground coffee and pods to choose from, plus single-origin and house blends. We sampled one of its newest offerings, Coast, which blends arabica and robusta beans to produce a dark, rich brew. If you’re a fan of Italian coffee, which also typically uses robusta and is more bitter than acidic, this is an ideal pick – it’s earthy and intense, with notes of dark chocolate.
Available from:
Volcano Coffee Works – The Mount Blend
Available from Volcano Coffee Works (from £9)
Best all-rounder coffee beans
Coffee type: blend
Sourcing details of coffee tested: El Salvador, Columbia, Brazil
Flavour notes: Caramel, red grapes, milk chocolate
Recommended brew method: espresso, Aeropress, moka pot, cafetière, pour-over
Based in the suburbs of south London, Volcano Coffee Works was founded by Kurt Stewart in 2010. Bringing his experience of New Zealand coffee culture with him to the UK, the company is committed not only to coffee being not just good, but also sustainability and ethically traded. It’s working towards carbon-neutral status and pays its suppliers more than the Fairtrade rates for the coffee.
In the tasting we were impressed by The Mount Blend, which is a mixture of beans from El Salvador, Columbia and Brazil. As a blend, it has a more consistent flavour profile than a specific crop or specific harvest.
We picked up smooth sweetness of milk chocolate, plus even a playful note of candy floss with delicate acidity to keep everything in balance. Subtle sharpness came through as hints of lime zest and sherry vinegar, while a light bitterness reminded us of grape and plum skins. We found this incredibly versatile, showing itself well in all brew methods.
Available from:
Square Mile – Red Brick espresso
Available from Square Mile (from £14.50)
Best coffee beans for coffee aficionados
Coffee type: blend
Sourcing details of coffee tested: Ethiopia, Costa Rica
Flavour notes: Orange, fudge, caramel and cherry
Recommended brew method: espresso
If you’re a fan of YouTube coffee influencer James Hoffman, you might already be aware of Square Mile. The East London-based roaster was founded by him and World Cup Tasters Champion Anette Moldvaer in 2008, and is now led by managing director Felicity Whitehead.
Clear in its mission to “source outstanding, seasonal coffee, roast it to bring out its best and deliver a coffee experience that delights”, Square Mile works closely with coffee farmers and operates within a sustainable, transparent supply chain. For aspiring baristas, it also runs tasting events throughout the year, as well as hands-on training programmes at its Prufrock Barista Training centre – where you can master a range of skills and earn qualifications.
In testing, we tried Square Mile’s signature medium-roast blend, Red Brick, which brings together beans from Costa Rica and Ethiopia to deliver rich, fudgy notes with a hint of citrus – perfect for an espresso. As the crops change throughout the year, so does the taste of the coffee; reflecting the shift in harvest cycles and celebrating the seasonality of the beans. A great pick for anyone who wants something a little more unique and premium.
Available from:
Other coffee beans tried and tested
- Redemption Roasters – The Block, from £9.90
- Rave Coffee – Signature Blend, £7.75
How to brew coffee
Below are basic quantities and timings for making coffee using popular methods.
Espresso (single shot):
7g fine ground coffee
30ml hot water
Total brew time: 25-30 seconds
French press/cafetière:
75g coarse ground coffee per litre of water (adjust as necessary)
Filtered hot water, just boiled (poured to an inch from the top)
Total brew time: 4 mins
Moka pot:
15g fine ground coffee (slightly coarser than for espresso)
250ml filtered water (poured to the level below the safety valve)
Total brew time: 2 mins or until the pot starts gurgling
Pour-over:
25-27g medium-fine ground coffee
415ml filtered hot water, just boiled
Total brew time: 3 mins
Aeropress:
18-20g medium-fine ground coffee
About 250ml filtered hot water, just boiled (poured to the top)
Total brew time: 2 mins
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Can you recommend a brand of coffee beans? Leave a comment below…
This review was last updated in January 2025. If you have any questions, suggestions for future reviews or spot anything that has changed in price or availability please get in touch at goodfoodwebsite@immediate.co.uk.
