The Best Coffee Scales | 2025 Review / Purchasing Guide

Simply put? I just don't like these. From my uses, they're not particularly sensitive when weighing above 500g, switching to weighing in 0.5g increments rather than 0.1g. The sloped part at the back of the scale is perfect for letting your portafilter slide off and spill your coffee everywhere, should you decide to use it as a bench scale - and the timer and interface looks like it was borrowed from a cheap '90s calculator.

The refresh rate of the feed is quite slow compared to other scales and so it's very easy to overshoot your target brew weight. Oh, and you can totally forget about using these scales underneath an espresso group head.

The buttons are flat and not very responsive, so you're never quite sure if you've pressed them properly. The littler rubber feet on the bottom have a tendency for falling out, and if memory serves me correctly, the scale works off of batteries and it's not rechargeable.

Is it better than a standard set of kitchen scales? Yes, but only just.

Is it functional? It's ok for filter brewing, but not really functional if you want to use these scales for anything else.

The defensive position that many people adopt for these scales is that they're very useful for weighing beans, and fitting on drip trays - to which I point out, so are virtually all other scales that you could buy, except those other scales are a hundred times less hassle... And they work!

This isn't directed any one brand in particular, but these little scales are limited basically to brewing espresso, they always seem to accumulate sticky espresso residue under the weighing plate which is difficult to clean off, the flip lid makes them ideal for getting in the way or closing unexpectedly, and the cheap metal has a tendency to rust.

You know - this is one of those times where I genuinely don't know why I don't like using this product. Generally speaking, I absolutely love Brewista's stuff - I constantly rave about how I've owned one of their Gooseneck Kettles for over 10 years and it's still going strong, and my favourite kettle that I own.

But something about these scales is just annoying. It might be the buttons, which feel clanky and cheap. The refresh rate is just not that good on them, and they're £80. Which just feels mental for a set of scales that I don't even like.

If the refresh rate on them were better, I think I'd probably quite like these for brewing espresso, but I find it very difficult to get my target brew weight with these, which (in espresso brewing) is a big deal.

Sorry, cafes and avid defenders. But no! Rhinoware makes great knock chutes and pitcher rinsers, but terrible scales (and milk jugs IMO). I'm sorry, I just hate these. The main attraction to these is their 0.1g sensitivity as bench scales for weighing out your dose into your portafilter... But after 2-3 drinks, they're out by 0.2g, then after a few more they're out by 0.4, then 0.6, which totally defeats the point of bench scales - which are supposed to be consistent for your barista.

The annoyance of taring every few drinks to offset the variance of the scale is not worth the price point. I understand that they're only £30, but they're painful to use. And no timer too, so I can't even choose practically to use these with a filter brewer - sorry, but it's a no from me!

Sigh - This is painful for me to immortalise in writing, because my favourite set of scales of all time - My 2014 Acaia Pearls - are still in use at my home every single day and my favourite piece of kit that I've ever owned... and the irony is, I probably still think that the Lunar is the best drip tray scale ever made - I even own a pair and I carry them everywhere I go in my rucksack. I have used them at two UK coffee championships and won accolades with these things...

So why don't I recommend them, if I like Acaia so much?

The point of these scales is to be extremely high quality, durable, and perform at the highest level in an espresso setting... which frequently means pulling shots of espresso using bottomless portafilters or weighing manually every single shot on an espresso machine.

The thing is, there are just a few things which are very annoying, that for £250-£300 - I just can't say: Yes, please spend that kind of money.

1. If you're using a bottomless portafilter and a minuscule spray channel fires out the world's tiniest amount of espresso onto the power or tare buttons; that tiny minuscule bit of espresso will immediately activate either of those buttons. Meaning that you can unintentionally tare or stop your timer. Very annoying.

2. The second thing is, if you're sitting them on the drip tray of your home machine - if the machine works off of a vibration pump (like most home machines), you'll start your shot and watch as your set of Acaia Lunars begin to drift across the drip tray, or that your cups start to slide off of the scales.

It's not too bad if you have a heavy set of cups, and once there is liquid in the cups, it stops happening, but it's so annoying and seems totally avoidable. One tactic which is frequently used in the Barista championships is to lay down some felt on top of the scale to prevent this from happening, but that seems a little unhygienic for the home or cafe environment - and the little rubber mat that it comes with is not very useful at stopping this from happening either. The mat that comes with the pearl is VERY good, but for some reason, not the one that came with the Lunar.

So yes. Two annoying functions that I think turn most people off using this scale, and ones which are preventable. Ironically still probably the best pair of Drip tray scales that exists on the market, but for almost £300, you'd hope for such things to not be an issue.

A surprise for some, as these have their own cult following, I get on quite well with the team at Fellow and again I think they make (mostly) excellent products. For me, nothing against these, these are great pourover scales, but in my opinion, they're simply outperformed by other scales in the same price bracket, which are useful for multiple things...

The thing with this scale is that its only real use is for brewing filter coffee and not much else, and this mainly comes from the choice to use a circular weighing plate, which gives a reduction of space without really making the footprint of the scale any smaller.

They're too big to be drip tray scales, and they're not big enough to make decent bench scales. The smart brew feature doesn't really have much of a use case in my opinion. It's not much effort to figure out how much water to use if you're using an unfamiliar dose. A lot of features, but I debate how useful some of these are.

Now that we've got this little bit out of the way, let's talk about:

1. Best All-round Budget Scales

Timemore Basic - £50

I have stopped taking a pair of scales with me when I visit family, because they've got a pair of these - they're honestly pretty good for the price. Would they replace my Lunars or my Pearls or my Inclines or my Parallels? No.

But if you can't justify £100 for a set of scales (valid btw), this is a great alternative - the gateway drug of the scales world.

I will say, I would personally want a little faster refresh rate - the display on the white scales is a little hard to see honestly, but on the black scales it's very good.

That being said, there are a few annoying functionality issues that I have with this scale.
There's an annoying little 3... 2... 1... That flashes up when you start the timer, and it always catches me out. Where I don't use these every day, I haven't figured out if there is a way to turn that off, or if it's a permanent feature, but it makes me ask the question: Who, exactly, is that feature for? It's actually just kind of annoying, especially when brewing espresso, because best practice is to lock in the portafilter and brew immediately, not lock in and wait for a 3-2-1 countdown before I can brew.

But, as an all rounder, these are great for filter, espresso brewing, bench scales (they're big enough for a portafilter diagonally). But in bench scales, I think the annoying thing is that if you lay it diagonally, the portafilter will sometimes end up sitting on the tare feature, and tare your portafilter when actually... I want to be weighing what I've just put into it.

But for £50: cheap, cheerful, rechargeable and multipurpose. This one scale will last you a very long time and cover a lot of different use cases - Easy.

Pros:

• Great Value
• Rechargeable, decent battery life
• Good for espresso (drip tray), filter coffee brewing & bench scale usage

Cons:

• Not the fastest refresh rate
• Annoying countdown feature (for me at least!)
• Can sometimes tare at annoying times

 

2. Best Drip Tray / Espresso Scales

Felicita Arc - £140

As I said at the start of this, full honest opinions:

Do I think this scale is quite as good as the Acaia Lunar? Probably not in all honesty, but the difference is so small and inconsequential that I can't justify that extra £150 price tag for the Lunars.

Additionally, although I'm a square scale kinda person, these are actually a bit better for holding two cups if you want to split your shots due to the slightly rectangular orientation - again that's actually clever and something that the Lunar doesn't offer.

This scale can fit a portafilter on it (just) where the lunars can't really, so if you were looking for only one scale to use for espresso, I don't know why you would choose the Lunars over these; other than the Lunars are slightly more responsive with regards to their refresh rate. In all honesty, the ergonomics of this is just better thought through with regards to what people will actually be using this scale for - therefore they have to take the spot for my recommendation. Sorry Acaia, you know we love you.

Drawbacks: Yes, it still suffers from spray channels and other water potentially causing issues with regards to taring, and the taring beep noise isn't as nice as on the Acaia Lunars.

Pros:

• Great Responsiveness & consistency
• Rechargeable, decent battery life
• Intuitive usage, easy to stop the shot on your desired beverage weight
• Fits 2 cups comfortably
• Fits portafilter, so you would only need one scale for your full espresso setup
• Super Accurate

Cons:

• Could have a faster refresh rate
  
• Rogue spray channels can activate the tare or timer function

3. Best Filter Brewing Scales - Acaia Pearl S / Felicita Parallel / UltraKoki

Acaia Pearl S - £200

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - the Acaia Pearl is the best scale ever made. They just look so good, the refresh rate is perfect for what you want and they are the perfect size. Yes, I'm probably biased, but as I often point out, I've had my set of Acaia Pearls (before they were discontinued in favour of the Pearl S) for 10 years and I haven't been able to fault them.

I'm talking specifically about the White Pearls in all honesty, because the Black model shows scratches, whereas you can't really see scratches on the White version - but the display is slightly better on the black version. Even for me at the moment, the material quality is so high that the scales (in spite of all their use) still look basically new - they haven't even stained yet and the battery life is still very good, even after all the use it's had.

This set of scales would easily win the all rounder category IF they were slightly shorter, because they are a little too wide to fit under some espresso machines, and in some drip trays. But in terms of intuitiveness, I find these scales the easiest to be accurate with, by far - and in fact many people use them at the World Barista Championships in tandem with the STEM, because of how responsive, accurate and intuitive they are to use.

I have always preferred the Original Pearls to the new Pearl S model, but I think that's just out of habit. They're awesome.

The only thing I will say, the only time I have ever seen one of these things get damaged in any way was when Will Harrigan (River Coffee) and I were working together at Hoxton Bakery and he washed it under the tap. Some water got in the charging port and it freaked out. It still worked after that, but it wasn't quite the same - so please don't put your scale's charging port under a running tap.

One final mention is that the numbers on the Pearl (White) can be a little bit hard to see in direct sunlight.

Pros:

• Probably the best scale ever made
• Rechargeable, Incredible battery life
• Good for filter coffee brewing & bench scale usage
• Great refresh rate
• Super Accurate
• Superb build quality

Cons:

• Can't really use for espresso (drip tray) without using the Nucleus STEM
• Sometimes you unintentionally switch onto ATR function, which is kind of annoying
• Display not the best in the sun

 

 

Felicita Parallel - £108

In all honesty, I wasn't sure whether to put these under best Bench scale or best Filter scale, but I think it deserves a mention in both, because it really is a fantastic filter coffee scale and much cheaper than the Pearl S.

The display is much better than on the Pearl, but the refresh rate is a little bit slower. I absolutely love how big the numbers are, and it's a very intuitive, super easy scale to use. These scales are quite large, which some people might see as a draw back, or a limiting thing because you can't use these under your espresso machine if you have one - but they're great bench scales - super accurate and very responsive to changes in dose.

We use this in the Roastery to brew coffee with, and as bench scales for our espresso machine. The battery life isn't quite as long as on the Acaia Pearls, but as I say - it's half the price.

 

Pros:

• Rechargeable, good battery life
• Good for filter coffee brewing & bench scale usage
  
• Super accurate
• Excellent value for what you get
• Great display

Cons:

• Can't really use for espresso (drip tray) without using the Nucleus STEM
  
• Could have a slightly faster refresh rate

 

 

UltraKoki - £250

So personally, I don't like the way these things look - but if you want the maximum performance out of a scale and aren't really bothered about how it looks, this is probably the best for one reason: It separates brew weight from beverage weight.

What's the use in that, I hear you ask?

Imagine that you are trying to get the very best possible brew out of your coffee that you possibly can. Knowing exactly how much water has passed into your bed of coffee (exactly) is a very, very useful metric. Many recipes online indicate using a higher thermal mass, (like 250g) in your brew, but cutting off the extraction early once your total beverage weight hits 200g, to avoid that last little bit of coffee that percolates through your bed of coffee appearing into your final beverage, and only serving what you want to serve.

In the home setting, it's only really a useful scale if coffee is a lot more than a hobby for you, and you're really interested in chasing perfection, rather than the daily ritual that is accompanied by 'nice stuff'. In the commercial setting, this scale has a bit more use, but it really shines in competition settings, just because of the extra metrics that you can get from it.

To be honest, I always find this brewer kind of annoying to use. I don't much like the display - or the text, or much else about it - but if you want a performance above all scale - this is the one.

Pros:

• Insane amounts of data available
• Performance above all scale
  
• Super Accurate
• Good for filter coffee brewing
• Great refresh rate

Cons:

• Can only use for filter brewing
• Kind of annoying to use
• Display is a bit small and naff

 

 

4. Best Bench / Portafilter Scales

Felicita Parallel - £108

As you can see, this scale features twice!

Genuinely, fantastic piece of kit, and very good bench scale. I prefer this scale to the Acaia Pearl for weighing and taring portafilters because of the separate weighing plate, meaning that you're able to use the scale without worrying about accidentally taring it mid-use (this does happen a lot with the Pearl).

It's very accurate and responsive to changes in dose. The plate is very stable and it's big enough to fit a portafilter on properly, unlike many other scales which claim to do the same thing. On top of that, it actually has a very good build quality, and if you have pre-programmed volumetrics into your machine, it will be the only scale you need for brewing espresso.

No Cons, it does everything you need a bench scale to do and at a very reasonable price. This is the market leader for us at the moment!

Pros:

• Rechargeable, good battery life
• Good for filter coffee brewing & bench scale usage
  
• Super accurate
• Excellent value for what you get
• Great display
• Perfect Bench scale

Cons:

• Can't really use for espresso (drip tray) without using the Nucleus STEM
  
• Could have a slightly faster refresh rate

 

5. Best All Rounder Scales

Felicita Incline - £95

A scale that we haven't mentioned once above, winning our recommendation for best all rounder... How has this happened?

Well, put very simply, this scale does everything very, very well. I think the manufacturer intended this as a pourover scale, but honestly, I think they stumbled across accidentally making the best all rounder scale on the market.

It's large enough to fit a portafilter comfortably, so it can perform very easily as a bench scale. It's wide enough so that you can weigh parallel to the display, so no chance of accidentally taring the scale while weighing a dose. It's responsive enough to be a decent pourover scale. The display is clear enough to be seen in direct light - the battery life is pretty good. And despite being big enough to be a bench scale, it's also small enough to fit in the drip tray of most home espresso machines.

You need to keep the little non slip mat on the scale if you're brewing espresso with it, as again, some vibration pumps will send cups hovering themselves off of the scale.

Genuinely a very impressive scale for the price, good build quality, very little bad to say about it. Individually, it's not winning any categories for us, just because there are some scales which perform their own specialisation much better - but this scale is basically an 8/10 in every category. So bravo to Felicita, they have made a super product here.

Pros:

• Brilliant all rounder
• Rechargeable, good battery life
• Good for filter coffee brewing, Espresso brewing and bench scale usage
  
• Pretty accurate
• Excellent value for what you get
• Great Display

Cons:

• Could have a slightly faster refresh rate

 

That concludes this purchasing guide, hopefully you've found this helpful!

Frequently Asked Questions

What accuracy should I look for in coffee scales?
At minimum, look for 0.1g resolution. If you dial in espresso frequently, 0.01g accuracy can help target a specific yield more consistently.

Is response speed important?
Yes. Fast response helps avoid overshooting your brew weight, especially with pour over and espresso shots.

Do I need a built-in timer?
A timer helps track bloom phase and total brew time without needing a separate device.

Should coffee scales be water-resistant?
Spills and steam are common. Water-resistant cases and heat-resistant mats extend scale life.

USB-C or batteries?
USB-C charges easily if you brew daily. Batteries last months for lighter use.

What size scale do I need?
For espresso shots, a compact scale fits under the group head. For pour-over servers, a larger platform is best.

Do coffee scales need calibration?
Occasionally calibrate with a 100g or 200g weight to keep readings accurate.

What capacity is best?
2kg maximum capacity covers nearly all home espresso and pour-over needs.

Do I need app connectivity?
Not required. Some scales can log brews, water weight, and timing if you want data tracking.

Take your brewing game to the next level:

Espresso lovers can also find our guide on the Best Coffee Tampers here.

Filter coffee lovers can find our guide on the Best Pourover Filter Coffee Recipes here.

Find some of the best free tools to accompany your brews here.

Find your perfect coffee from Harmony's selection of coffee beans here.

Check out our guide on resting coffee to get the most out of your brews here.

Find the Best Filter Coffee Grinders For Home here.

Learn about why RDT reduces static in coffee grinding here.

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Written by Ben, Head of Coffee at Harmony Coffee