OXO Brew Conical Burr Coffee Grinder - Matte Black

(I am an ex professional barista.)CONS:-The grounds container doesn't lock into place and will sometimes vibrate out during grinding. This is the only serious flaw with the product, and I feel it's a minor one. I've gone through many of the reviews and it seems that it's simply a matter of construction inconsistency. Most people's containers "click" into place; a minority do not. I was just unlucky enough to get one of the ones that don't.-You can't remove the bottom burr to clean it. They really did do their best to make this easy to clean and I appreciate that you don't have to undo a bunch of microscopic screws just to clean your burrs, but I really wish I could remove BOTH burrs to give them a thorough wipe-down. It's difficult to clean the one that's stuck inside the grinder. The other lifts out easily by a cute little handle.PROS:-High quality, consistent grind. The brewing methods I use most all hover around the medium grind range, so I haven't really tested the extremes of coarse and fine. Can't speak to those. But as far as the medium ranges, it grinds beautifully and consistently. That's what matters in the end, right?-The beans feed very well, even for single dosing. Never an issue.-As mentioned above, the ability to clean the grinder is taken into account in the construction. No need to delicately deconstruct the whole thing and keep track of a bunch of itty bitty screws and springs. The top part of the grinder and the top burr simply turn-and-lift out, and then turn-and-lock back into place. So nice.-It's aesthetically pleasing and takes up little room on the counter. All the materials have a quality feel.-It isn't super noisy. All grinders are gonna make noise, to be sure, but as far as grinders go, this one has a pretty gentle sound. I've definitely used my fair share of grinders that made me feel like my brain was going to vibrate out of my skull, and this one has a polite hum by comparison.-The price for this level of quality is unbeatable. I can't even believe I paid less than one hundred dollars for this. Real talk, folks: these are steel conical burrs. Solid construction. 40+ grind settings. Did I mention steel conical burrs? I never thought I would own something like this for less than $250. You cannot beat this price point/quality intersection. You just can't. This grinder is price-meets-quality king.USAGE:You're working with three variables: time, grind, and amount. There are two popular approaches to working out your dose.Method 1: You leave 'amount' as the open variable. With this method, you dump all your beans in the hopper and store them there. You then adjust grind and time until you're getting the right dose at the right grind level.Method 2: You leave 'time' as the open variable. With this method, you only deposit the amount of beans you plan to use for each dose, adjust the grind as needed, and let it take whatever amount of time it takes. You're adjusting the amount and the grind, rather than adjusting the grind and the time. (This is called "single dosing.")Go to any coffee forum, and you'll be pages of debate about which of these methods is superior. Honestly, you should use the method that feels best for YOU.The reason I bring it up here is because people seem anxious that Method #2 will damage the burrs over time, since you run them all the way to empty every time you grind.Here's my take: I use Method #2, because I feel that the beans start to taste stale if left in the hopper. (Everyone's tastebuds are different; there's no right or wrong.) This means that I let the burrs run until I hear the sound change from a low growl to a high pitched growl, which indicates that the burrs are grinding empty, and then I manually stop the grind.I honestly don't see any issue with this, and I don't feel any anxiety about it. Think about it: if you're cleaning the burrs between bean swaps, you're letting them run for several seconds on empty anyway. Even the manufacturer instructions tell you to do this when cleaning the burrs! The only difference here is that instead of intentionally running them on empty for several seconds to clean them, you're running them on empty for one single second every day/dose. I'd never recommend doing that on a fine espresso setting, but as long as you're in the medium-to-coarse range, I don't see any possible ways the burrs could damage each other. There's no way the burrs are touching at that distance, regardless of variables like heat expanding the metal and other things coffee nerds like to debate about.I hope this review was helpful. I'll update in a year to let you know if this grinder held up through daily use.

Had a cuisinart disc grinder that died after 5 years. Got the Oxo as a replacement 2 months ago. So much better! Consistent grind times and ground sizes. Good for however fine of grind I want. Non-stick collection cup works great. By far the quietest grinder I’ve ever had. Fits under my cabinet even on top of my pod tray. Comes apart easily to clean. Only slight complaint I have is that to move it, I need two hands because of the rounded shape. I still give it five stars.

My husband brews coffee almost every morning for both of us, and we’ve been really impressed with the OXO Brew Conical Burr Coffee Grinder in matte black. It grinds beans consistently and smoothly, making a noticeable difference in flavor. One of our favorite things is how quiet it is—unlike other grinders, it won’t wake up the whole house during those early mornings! The tinted reservoir is a smart feature too, helping protect the beans from light exposure and preserving their quality. Highly recommend this to anyone looking for a reliable, high-quality coffee grinder that performs beautifully

Lots of additional features on this grinder for the increase in price. Most important is that it grinds the coffee very consistently. The conical burr grinder is easy to access. The hopper is easy to remove without spilling the beans in the hopper. Quieter than the Cuisinart. I tried the Cuisinart $50 grinder first but returned it due to the poor and inconsistent grind quality. I think it was defective. The grinds on the right are the OXO and on the left are the Cuisinart using the same beans and the med grind setting on both units.

The media could not be loaded. To be as blunt and simple as possible, the OXO BREW Conical Burr Grinder is the worst product I have ever purchased online through Amazon. Furthermore, my wife has been in contact via email with OXO's customer support team about the poor quality of this product, and their support team refuses to either refund or replace the product. We have provided them with both videos and photos showing that the unit functions either very poorly or does not function at all without lots of troubleshooting. Yet, their engineers have responded saying that the unit appears to be functioning "normally" in the videos (one of which I will attach to this review). However, at this point the unit does not work without quite a bit of frustration--plugging and unplugging multiple times or sweeping out the burrs multiple times just to grind enough beans for a pour over coffee. Even though I have only owned this unit for one month, I see no other solution than to place this unit in the trash and buy a more expensive unit from another manufacturer. I am an avid home coffee brewer, and I have owned other coffee products from Bonavita, Hario, Mr. Coffee, Cuisinart, and OXO. I can say unequivocally, this OXO burr grinder is the worst coffee product I have ever owned or purchased. I will attach video and photographic proof that the unit does not work correctly and will explain further below the problems with the unit.Initially, the unit worked great. For the first week, the unit produced a reliable and consistent grind of Trader Joe's Ethiopian beans (~$8.99 a bag). Then, the trouble started the second week when I began grinding Stumptown Hair Bender beans (~$15.99 a bag). The unit jammed mid-cycle for the first time. The button on the front of the unit would not start the motor so I tried troubleshooting the unit in multiple ways, following the instructions in the owner's manual. I unplugged it and plugged it back in--start button still did not work. I opened the bean hopper and nothing appeared jammed. So finally I opened up the burrs and swept them out. When I put the unit back together, it worked, and I thought the problem was solved. However, over the next week, the unit kept jamming every time I used it with the Stumptown beans. Sometimes it would jam multiple times in a row. Each time I had to open the unit and sweep out the burrs to get it to work. This process, while being extremely frustrating and time-consuming, also caused the unit to produce an inconsistent grind size. I've attached a picture showing that I get chunks of beans in my pour over because I have to play an elaborate game with the machine just to get it to function. For a unit that regularly retails for around $100, this is absolutely unacceptable for a new product. Furthermore, if a $100 burr grinder cannot be used on a premium product like Stumptown, then that grinder is entirely worthless to coffee enthusiasts.After I finished the bag of Stumptown coffee, I tried the grinder again on the Trader Joe's beans (since those beans had initially worked well with the unit). Now, I began experiencing the same problems with Trader Joe's. In order to grind 5 scoops of beans for one large pour over coffee, I had to either: (1) Open and sweep the burrs multiple times or (2) Plug and unplug the unit multiple times because it grinds for about 3 seconds before jamming even when the timer is set on 30 seconds. I have attached a video showing the unit functioning in this way. In the video, you will see the game I have to play just to grind beans using a unit that was purchased only 3 weeks prior.Here's my personal thought regarding the performance issues of the machine. I assume the motor has a fail-safe feature designed to stop the motor in event that it becomes clogged. This would prevent the motor from being damaged if a very small stone or an extremely hard bean got stuck in the burrs (which can happen on a rare occasion). My guess is that this setting isn't quite right in my unit and that the unit stops every time there is the tiniest bit of resistance on the motor. This would explain why I have to unplug the unit multiple times just to completely grind a cup of beans. Either way, it is entirely unreasonable for OXO to expect users to have to troubleshoot a new unit with such frequency as a part of the unit's "normal" functioning.Currently, OXO does not want to address my concerns with this unit so I have decided to place this negative review. I've never felt compelled before to write a negative review on Amazon. Hopefully, they will decide to improve the product and respond to customer concerns. At this point, I cannot recommend this product to any other buyer, and I will no longer purchase any kitchen or coffee products manufactured by OXO. Finally, I've decided I don't even want a replacement for this unit. Even if OXO offered to replace it, I would refuse. That alone shows my level of disappointment with the product. The overall build quality feels cheap to me, especially the timer and start button on the front. I owned an entry-level Mr. Coffee burr grinder (~$30) for 7 years that "felt" better--button quality, weight of product, sound of motor, etc. If OXO decides to respond to my concerns, I will only accept a full refund for the purchase price of the product so that I can purchase another unit from a different manufacturer.UPDATE: OXO finally agreed to refund us the purchase price of the unit after I posted this negative review and video on Amazon. The refund process took some time, but we did eventually get a check in the mail for the full purchase price of the unit. We will explore other options for a replacement unit.