Review: Spinn

News of new coffee-brewing methods can sometimes feel tinged with a bit of wackiness. The glass spheres and bubbling water of siphons spring to mind, or the semi-risqué looking AeroPress pump. So when I heard about a new all-in-one coffee maker that grinds coffee beans then brews them using centrifugal force, I knew I’d have to check it out with my coffee people.

I had a Spinn coffee maker shipped straight to Olympia Coffee in Seattle, where co-owner Sam Schroeder, retail trainer Reyna Callejo, and I tore it out of the box and put it through its paces.

The Spinn coffee maker is certainly peculiar. Roughly Mr. Coffee–sized, you pour whole beans into the top and a short time later, it squirts an espresso-like beverage into your cup. Yet it’s an interim step that makes it so novel. The brewing happens in a centrifuge that spins at up to 5,000 rpm, forcing coffee through a perforated side wall that acts as a filter. Spent grounds go into a hopper right behind your new cup of joe. It reminds me of a mini version of those spinning amusement-park “rotor” rides where the floor drops out and you stick to the wall. Spinn’s coffee maker has desirable attributes of espresso machines and the AeroPress, and since it only requires you to tap a few buttons to make a cup, it’s as simple as a Keurig or Nespresso maker, brewing superior coffee without the eco-unfriendly capsules.

There are three drink preset buttons on the front of the machine for Espresso, Lungo, and Coffee, plus four you can customize. Or you can control it with a companion app, where there are more than two dozen customizable drink options. Sam saw this and enthusiastically declared, “Let’s make one of each!”

We didn’t make all the drinks, but we made a bunch, starting with espresso-style shots.

Punching the Ristretto button, the machine ground and whirred while the app tracked progress through different phases, from the Spinn-specific “welling” and “premoist”—“I’ve never heard these terms,” Sam noted—to more traditional “grinding” and “extraction.” We brewed some medium-roast beans that the folks at Spinn sent with the machine. All three of us just stared as it started dispensing liquid into a cup, then Reyna and I stared at Sam, who took the first sip.

“This is not as bad as I would have expected. It’s like if you ordered an espresso at Starbucks Reserve Roastery,” he said, packing a tennis game’s worth of backhands into two sentences.

We made espressos, doppios (double shots), americanos, and coffees. You can customize all of these, changing the weight of grounds and final volume of each drink. If you’ve got favorite drinks and favorite mugs, you can use the app to customize four presets on the front of the machine and then skip the app altogether.

We next tried Olympia’s roast from Guatemalan farmer Ovidio Garcia, which was exciting as we could do a head-to-head comparison between shots poured from the Spinn and from Olympia’s espresso machine.

The Spinn can be accessorized with a glass carafe ($65) and a milk frother ($99).

Photograph: Thomas Van Schaik/Spinn

“Spinn’s is surprisingly good. Not the same body and long-lasting finish as what we pour here, but it’s pretty darn good. I’d be very impressed to have one of these at somebody’s house,” Reyna said, taking another taste. “I’d compare it with the quality you might get at a bakery that cared about its coffee program.”

Sam and Reyna could never quite give a full-throated endorsement—everything was positive with a bit of Sam-style slice, but they were comparing against their own high-end cafe offerings. This was impressive considering we barely had the Spinn out of the box for an hour.

It quickly became clear that if you like making espresso at home, but want something more hands off than an espresso machine, this is a competitor to “super automatic” machines like Jura’s and beats the pants off of Keurig and Nespresso machines.

We fiddled with the app as we went, learning to appreciate the tweakability of variables like the amount of coffee and size of the drink before making a cup. (We also wished we had the option to save the changes after we tasted the results.) We all loved having the ability to make just a single cup, which is great news for people who don’t want to deal with the restraints of capsules and their ecological implications.

“The Spinn is for people who think about their coffee …” said Reyna, turning the second half of the thought to Sam.

“… but don’t want to be involved in the process. Ours is better, obviously, but the Spinn’s is surprisingly solid.”

Plus, you’re not locked into the capsule system and can use whichever coffee you want. Well, almost. One dealbreaker for dark-roast lovers like me is that the Spinn does not work well with oily beans like French roast. The Spinn website says not to use oilier beans because they can clog the machine’s innards, and there’s no way for a customer to get in there to clean things out. Worse, it’s hard to know where to draw the line. One dark roast might be fine, another less so. What if you’re at the bodega and the bag you want to buy isn’t see-through?

We soon realized that the Spinn is more of an espresso-style machine, better at pumping out a simple shot or making espresso drinks like americanos or lattes than its version of a drip brew. If you want a drip coffee machine with the impressive ability to make single cups as well as full carafes, opt for the Oxo 8-Cup Coffee Maker.

One exciting and unexpected discovery came from the grounds, which accumulate in a bin hidden in the bottom of the machine; while spent grounds in a normal coffee-maker basket are wet when you empty them, and an AeroPress or espresso machine eject a hot, damp brick, the Spinn grounds are almost completely dry.

“This is amazing,” Sam said. “You’re using fewer beans. You’re saving money by getting more coffee from your coffee.”

The Spinn is not perfect. The reliance on the app is more dependent than it should be. The company’s homepage video makes a big deal about being able to start your coffee from bed so it’s ready when you arrive in the kitchen, but I’m not sure that’s a problem that needed solving. How long, exactly, is your “journey” between bed and coffee maker that it’s worth fussing with your phone on the way? Did you remember to put a cup below the spout before you went to bed? Do you mind that it takes longer to start a cup on your phone than it takes to press one of the Spinn’s preset buttons? If anything, I’d prefer a remote “preheat” function on the app to warm the innards of the machine while I brush my teeth, then I’d have it make my coffee while I butter my toast.

Having more controls on the machine itself—including a little screen like some Brevilles have—would be preferable to fiddling around with your phone while standing in front of the machine. You can create a custom preset on the machine to dispense hot water, but it really should have its own button. We also took a look at Spinn’s $99 milk frother, which did fine at foaming a small amount of milk, but there are far better and more voluminous options out there.

If you do it the way Spinn wants you to do it, you’ll use the app to order specialty coffee directly from the company, then scan the bag for coffee that’s customized to the roast. You can use beans from the coffee shop or grocery store, you’ll just have to adjust the default specs to suit. God bless Spinn for giving the small producers space to sell on its app, but it would be smart to include some more budget-conscious national brands. Since Spinn’s medium roast costs $20 for 12 ounces, how about a little Major Dickason’s Blend from Peet’s? Some Kirkland Colombian Supremo? Maybe an Affleck-JLo-approved bag from Dunkin’?

There’s also some math you’ll want to ponder. Spinn’s retail price is $1,000, and though it’s currently on sale for $799, that’s still not cheap. That same money will buy you a very solid home espresso maker, which will be a more hands-on coffee-making process. On the other hand, it’s a lot more than a Keurig or Nespresso machine, but you end up paying more per cup with those, so if you drink a lot of coffee, that will level out over time. If you’re a drip-coffee fan, you will be better off with the Oxo, which costs about $200.

Photograph: Thomas Van Schaik/Spinn

We bumped into a bit of a problem when we decided to switch beans. There is no easy way to empty the Spinn’s beans hopper without the risk of a messy disaster; it’s best to just run a batch through the machine, then switch your beans when the hopper is empty.

I’d later discover that though you can tell the Spinn how many grams you’d like it to use per drink, it doesn’t actually weigh the grounds out. Instead, it “pulses” them through the grinder, which should dispense the weight you want into the brewing chamber. But every once in a while, beans don’t flow along the bottom of the shallow hopper the way they should, meaning it ends up pouring what you might call a “ghost shot” with too few or no grounds in the brewing chamber. It also had the effect of having me obsessively moving beans directly over the chute to the grinder to keep that from happening. A more traditional, steep-walled hopper would help, though it won’t solve the oily-bean problem.

I was also underwhelmed with the design: a flat-topped oval, like some miniature 1990s office complex mid-rise for your countertop. Physical buttons and knobs would help you make adjustments more easily while you’re still waking up; flipping through the custom presets with the “personalized coffee serving” button is fiddly and annoying. A larger water tank and more generic water filter would be welcome, though paying an extra $200 for the Pro option gives you the option to tie the Spinn into a water line.

Still, like Sam and Reyna, I was happily surprised at how well it worked and the quality of coffee it made. I used it daily for weeks at home and didn’t miss my regular coffee setup too much. It’s certainly more unique and interesting than whacky. It costs a lot, but performs well. If you love good coffee—especially espresso-style drinks—and don’t mind the cost or dark-roast restrictions, but also don’t want the fuss of an espresso maker, this might be the one for you.