This story is part of our end-of-year series This Year in Gear rounding up the most notable releases of 2020. For more stories like this, click here.
Coffee has always been an important part of our lives. In 2020, you could argue its importance peaked. With no office coffee to rely on, and likely fewer opportunities to find a good coffee shop, we’ve had to rely on home coffee gear more than usual. Luckily these 11 releases from this year ensured our fuel tanks were always on full and a delicious brew was never more than an arm’s length away.
Fellow Ode Brew Grinder
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Fellow kept us — and five thousand Kickstarter backers, who coughed up $1.2 million — waiting at the edge of our seat for this to drop. When it did, it did not disappoint. It’s a relatively quiet coffee grinder with 31 easy-to-adjust grind settings that keeps messes to a minimum thanks to an ingenious grounds knocker.
Price: $299
Dripkit x Café Unido
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The coffee varietal Geisha, which hails from Panama, can fetch hundreds at auction. But because of Dripkit and its partnership with Panamanian coffee shop Café Unido, you can get a cup of Geisha coffee for just $7 (yes, we get it’s still more expensive than a cup from Starbucks). The collaboration finds Geisha coffee housed in Dripkit’s clever to-go brewing tripods, a contraption that makes coffee in an instant without being traditional instant coffee.
Price: $7
Oxo 8-cup Coffee Maker
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With Oxo’s latest coffee maker, people can toggle between brewing a single serving or a large batch brew. It’s SCA-certified to make a Golden Cup Standard coffee, and that’s really all you need to know. Almost every non-pod coffee brewer is better than a Keurig machine, but Oxo’s is definitely primed to be a Keurig killer.
Price: $170
Taika
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Taika is a line of adaptogenic-infused coffee beverages, which includes black coffee and two milk-alternative latte drinks. Its cofounder, Kal Freese, is a two-time Finnish Barista Champion, who infuses each drink with a “Taika Blend” of adaptogens to help reduce caffeine jitters. That means you can drink up, stay focused and forego the coffee crash.
Price: $59
Elemental Beverage Co. Small Batch Series
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Elemental Beverage Co. makes iced coffee by brewing coffee hot then snapchilling it. This process traps the flavors you get from brewing hot that are often lost to cold brewing. The brand came out last year, but in 2020, it launched its Small Batch Series, which highlights coffees in limited supply. So when a can from the series comes out, get it before it’s gone for good.
Price: $40
Biden Blend Coffee
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Biden Blend Coffee is a gimmicky product with a purpose. Entrepreneur Charlie Melvoin partnered with Bixby Roasting Company to make coffees that come in tea packet-form, with proceeds going towards VoteVets.org, a non-profit that supports veterans.
Price: $20
Breville Bambino Espresso Maker
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Breville’s new Bambino espresso maker is its most affordable yet. The compact machine nails all the things that made us love the Bambino Plus, but for $200 less and without the automatic steam wand.
Price: $300
Brain Dead Passport To Eternal Bliss Dream Coffee
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Non-coffee brands have a bad habit of slapping their name on a bag of coffee beans and calling it an exclusive collaborative effort. Streetwear brand Brain Dead has collabed on everything from Modernica tables to Magic: The Gathering apparel. Its Passport To Eternal Bliss Dream coffee comes from Australian coffee shop Wood and Co., and the Ethiopian beans are produced by Aleme Wako. The fact that we know who produced the coffee already tells us that it’s of exceptional quality. Because it’s naturally processed, the beans are going to have a subtle funkiness, not unlike everything Brain Dead does.
Price: $25
Jot
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Put down the freeze-dried coffee granules for a different type of instant coffee. Jot is a coffee concentrate that prioritizes taste just as much as convenience and ease of use. One tablespoon is all you need to make a coffee of iced coffee or a latte.
Price: $24
Slurp Rare
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Coffee subscriptions are not new, but none offer beans like Slurp Rare. Two-time Finnish Barista Champion Jarno Peräkylä and Alexander Ruas, of Stockholm’s Standout Coffee, curate the competition-grade coffee beans, and Ruas roasts all the beans in Stockholm. Subscribers receive 100-gram bags of rare varietals with a focus on experimental processing methods. And though it’s based in Finland, Slurp ships worldwide.
Price: ~$31
Hario Electric Solo
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Manually grinding coffee is a huge pain. But if you already own a hand grinder, it may seem wasteful to throw it to the wayside for an electric coffee grinder. Hario’s Electric Solo is a $95 accessory for converting your existing Hario grinder into an electric one.
Price: $95
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