Oxo Brew 8-Cup Coffee Maker review: Oxo’s latest coffee maker is our new favorite drip machine

A high-quality drip coffee maker really should brew quick and sizzling, but it shouldn’t scorch your grounds. Couple coffee devices can pull off this sensitive balancing act, but the $one hundred seventy Oxo Brew eight-Cup Coffee Maker is a single of the uncommon devices that does. For $20 much less than the nicely-highly regarded $a hundred ninety Bonavita Connoisseur, the Oxo Brew delivers SCA Golden Cup-rated coffee that preferences just as good.

Oxo’s hottest electrical coffee maker also comes with a thermal carafe that, contrary to the Bonavita’s, is not inclined to messy drips and spills when you pour from it. The Oxo coffee maker is compact, easier on the eyes than the Connoisseur, and it feels sturdier, way too. All that can make the Oxo Brew eight-Cup an fantastic purchase, and sufficient to receive our Editors’ Decision award for drip coffee makers in 2020.

Little and smooth

Bodily, the Oxo Brew eight-Cup is every little thing its beefy Oxo 12-cup and 9-cup predecessors weren’t. These devices were massive and cumbersome monstrosities, specially the Oxo Barista Mind 12-Cup Brewing Process, which towered in excess of other smaller kitchen area appliances and ate up useful counter space. 

The Oxo Brew eight-Cup is equivalent in measurement to the Bonavita Connoisseur. Each coffee makers are compact sufficient to tuck away underneath kitchen area cupboards when they’re not in use. Mainly because of the Oxo’s sleeker lines, plus heaps of open space in between its different elements, the Brew eight-cup appears downright svelte next to the chunkier Connoisseur.

Aesthetics aside, the Brew eight-Cup is set up like lots of other higher-functionality drip coffee makers. A heating device tower and h2o tank (40 ounces, one.two liters) sits on a single side of a very long foundation. You may obtain a double-walled thermal carafe across from that. A funnel-shaped brewing chamber lives directly higher than the carafe.   

Making use of the Oxo Brew eight-Cup

Building coffee with the Oxo Brew eight-Cup is a straightforward process. Initially, fill the coffee machine’s h2o tank. Its optimum (and default) measurement is 40 ounces. That’s the similar h2o potential as other premium coffee makers this kind of as the Technivorm Moccamaster KBT 741 and the Bonavita Connoisseur.

Next, flip open the brewing chamber lid. The filter basket inside of that accepts standard eight-cup measurement, flat-bottomed paper filters. Release the basket by swinging its tackle arm upwards Then drop a filter inside of, add your ground coffee, and put it back into the equipment. 

Make guaranteed the swap on the brewing chamber is set for a comprehensive carafe. Also, strike the ability button and faucet the button labeled “5-eight cups”. If you would like to brew much less you can find also a two-four cup button for that intent. Oxo also involves an optional brew basket designed specially for one-cup brewing. It accepts Kalita wave filters (Kalita 185).

I do have a single minimal gripe right here. The Oxo’s filter basket would not sit flat on counter tops. That produced it tricky to fill with grounds except if I held it in a single hand. The Connoisseur’s filter basket has a flat base, so is easier to fill when it can be resting on your countertop.

Overall performance and style

Each the Bonavita Connoisseur and its predecessor, the BV1900TS, executed exceptionally nicely on my tests. So did the Oxo Brew eight-Cup Coffee Maker. In phrases of uncooked brewing velocity, the Oxo Brew was equipped to fill its pot in an regular of 6 minutes and eight seconds. That’s near to the brewing velocity of the BV1900TS as nicely as the Technivorm Moccamaster KBT 741 (both coming in at 5 minutes, 45 seconds), and quicker than the Connoisseur (6 minutes, 25 seconds).  

As outlined in the manual, I utilised a brewing ratio of 40 ounces of h2o to two.26 ounces (64 grams) of medium ground coffee. I also examined with my typical complete bean examination coffee sourced from Costco (Kirkland Colombian Supremo).

Regardless, the Oxo Brew eight-Cup’s brewing time is nicely underneath the eight minutes or much less the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) recommends for good drip. 

Speed is not all which is essential to brew excellent coffee. Exact h2o warmth stages are also critical. Exclusively, the accurate h2o temperature vary (197 degrees Fahrenheit/92 Centigrade to 205 F/96 C) is important to earning fantastic coffee. I can verify that the Oxo coffee maker stored its h2o temperature in just a really limited vary. 

In the initial moment of brewing, the regular temperature inside of the grounds was a hundred ninety.three F (87.9 C), according to thermocouple readings. That’s quicker than the Connoisseur, which experienced a reduce regular temperature at the one moment mark (147.9 F, 64.four C). At two minutes, the temperature inside of the Oxo’s brew chamber remained rock strong (189.four F). By moment three, the temperature crept up to 197.6 F, then to 199.three F at moment four. From right here warmth stages were continuous, hardly expanding much more than three degrees.  

Our refractometer, which steps the amount of money of coffee dissolved in the liquid, showed likewise dependable functionality from the Oxo. Throughout a few operates using the Oxo-encouraged 64 grams of coffee grounds, the Oxo Brew eight-Cup notched closely grouped TDS (complete dissolved solids) proportion effects (one.four, one.5, one.6%). These figures translate to an regular extraction proportion of 25%. 

That’s slightly outdoors of the ideal vary, usually held to be in between 18 and 22%. The Oxo Brew’s manual also indicates using a much less specific “eight scoops” of coffee with the bundled plastic scoop. When I calculated eight scoops of my examination coffee, it weighed out to precisely 69.6 grams. Immediately after brewing all over again with 40 ounces of h2o, I recorded a TDS proportion of one.three. This calculates to an extraction proportion of 19%, which falls squarely inside of the SCA vary.  

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The coffee was strong, complex, well balanced, and experienced no trace of bitterness. The drip I produced with fewer grounds (64 grams) tasted high-quality way too, just a small weak. I also produced coffee at a strong ratio of 83 grams coffee to 40 ounces of h2o. Daring, intensive, and super-concentrated, this was my favorite pot. With an extraction proportion of 23%, it was also a hair outdoors golden cup vary. Regardless of the ratio, the Oxo brewer produced coffee that was never ever bitter and really drinkable. You may well have to modify the coffee and h2o ratio to your actual preferences, but Golden Cup-territory is really achievable with the Oxo brewer.

Similar to the Connoisseur, the Oxo’s thermal carafe can hold liquid inside of it sizzling for hours. I recorded three hours and 45 minutes in advance of coffee in the container dropped beneath 150 degrees F (66 C). That’s slightly shorter operate than the Bonavita 1900 which hung on to its warmth longer (almost four hours), while the thermal carafe champion is however the Moccamaster (6 hours).

A new alternative for much better drip

I have to say I’m really amazed with Oxo’s hottest electrical drip coffee maker. The $one hundred seventy Oxo Brew eight-Cup performs nicely, whipping up pots of delicious joe quickly. It is also compact, and attractively styled. I also like that it comes with a one-provide accessory for earning automated pour-in excess of, a single cup at a time.

All this stacks up favorably in opposition to the competitiveness. Till now, my drip coffee maker of selection has been the $a hundred ninety Bonavita Connoisseur. Even so, the Oxo Brew eight-Cup brews just as nicely and quicker, and seems to be much better executing it. It expenditures $20 much less way too, and does a small much more. That’s why it can be obviously exceptional in my e book, and the winner of our Editors’ Decision award.