Coffee Grind Size Chart
Where each brewer starts, what the grounds should feel like between your fingers, and which way to turn the dial when the cup comes out sour or bitter.
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Grind finer the shorter the water stays on the coffee. An espresso shot is done in about half a minute, so it gets the finest setting you'll use, a little finer than table salt. A pour-over cone or a drip machine takes a few minutes and sits in the middle, around the feel of sand. A French press steeps for four minutes and cold brew for half a day, so both want a coarse grind, about like kosher salt or bigger.
The chart below lines up nine common ways to brew, with what the grounds should look like and their size in microns (a micron is a thousandth of a millimeter) for grinders that print a step size. Use it to start, then let the cup steer you: sour and thin means go finer, bitter and dry means go coarser, and a good grinder turns that into one small move of the dial.
If you're still grinding with a blade or buying it ground, get the Encore ESP. It's about $200, and its dial reaches every row of this chart, espresso included.
The grind size chart
| Method | Grind | What it feels like | Microns |
|---|---|---|---|
| Espresso | Fine | finer than table salt | 180 to 380 |
| Moka pot | Medium-fine | gritty, a step coarser than espresso | 360 to 660 |
| AeroPress | Medium-fine | finer than drip, coarser than espresso | 320 to 960 |
| Hario V60 | Medium-fine | table salt, or fine sand | 400 to 700 |
| Drip machine | Medium | ordinary sand | 300 to 900 |
| Chemex | Medium-coarse | a step finer than French press | the coarse end of 410 to 930 |
| French press | Coarse | kosher salt | 690 to 1,300 |
| Cold brew | Very coarse | chunky kosher salt, rock salt | 800 to 1,400, some recipes coarser |
| Cold drip | Medium-coarse to coarse | sea salt, close to French press | 820 to 1,270 |
The ranges are wide, and they overlap, because they're a place to start rather than one right answer: every grinder makes a mix of sizes, never one, and every recipe for the same brewer is a little different. The numbers are Honest Coffee Guide's, gathered from brewing, readers' feedback and Specialty Coffee Association standards.
The dashed line is the grind coffee pros use when they taste coffees side by side, about 850 microns, a little coarser than a paper-filter drip. Everything to its left is finer.
Why brew time decides the grind
Water pulls flavor out of the outside of each piece of coffee first and works its way in. Small pieces have far more outside for their size, so they give up their flavor fast. Big pieces take their time. Match the size to how long the water has, and everything finishes at about the same moment: sweet, full, not harsh.
Get it wrong one way and the water leaves before it's done, which tastes sour and thin. Get it wrong the other way and it keeps pulling past the good part into the bitter, dry end. Level Ground, AeroPress and Baratza all give the same rule for fixing it: sour or watery, grind finer; bitter or harsh, grind coarser.
Method by method
Espresso. The machine pushes water through a packed puck in seconds, so the grind has to be fine enough to hold it back. Baratza's starting recipe is 18 g of coffee for 36 g of espresso in 25 to 32 seconds. A shot that runs out well before 25 seconds and tastes sour needs a finer grind; one that crawls well past 32 and tastes harsh needs a coarser one. Keep the dose the same while you adjust, or you won't know which change did what.
Moka pot. Bialetti asks for a medium grain, coarser than espresso. Fill the basket level and don't press it down or pile it into a dome. If you find a layer of powder at the bottom of your cup, Bialetti says the grind was too fine.
AeroPress. AeroPress starts people at medium-fine, finer than drip and coarser than espresso, and its range is wide because AeroPress recipes vary so much, from quick presses to long steeps. A couple of percent dripping through before you press is normal, says AeroPress, so there's no need to change the grind for it.
Hario V60. The cone has one big hole, so the coffee bed does the slowing down. Medium-fine, about like table salt, puts a one-mug brew near three minutes. If it runs past four, go coarser. My V60 guide has the full recipe in grams.
Drip machine. Medium, the feel of ordinary sand. The machine sets the water flow, so you can only move the grind. If the pot comes out weak or sour, go a notch finer; if it turns bitter, go coarser.
Chemex. A step finer than a French press. Stumptown's recipe uses 42 g ground medium-coarse, which it compares to kosher salt, for 700 g of water and about four minutes.
French press. Coarse, and Bodum is firm about it: fine grounds can clog the mesh and make the plunger hard to push. An even coarse grind is also what keeps the sludge out of the last sip.
Cold brew. The National Coffee Association compares it to rock salt, and Toddy tells you to use the coarsest setting you have. There's one exception worth knowing: Hario's Mizudashi pot asks for medium-fine, because in that pot coarse grounds come out weak. My cold brew guide goes through the recipes maker by maker.
Cold drip. Iced water drips through the grounds one drop at a time. Medium-coarse to coarse, about like sea salt, and close to a French press: Honest Coffee Guide puts it at 820 to 1,270 microns. The towers themselves are in my cold drip coffee makers guide.
How to set your grinder
Start where your brewer's maker or your recipe says, then change one thing at a time. That means the same beans, the same weight of coffee and the same water, with only the grind moving. A scale makes that easy: the rule of thumb in most recipes is 15 g of beans for 250 ml of water, about one mug.
Move in small steps. On a hand grinder with numbered clicks, one click is often enough. The C3S Pro moves its burrs 83 microns a click, and the whole V60 range in the chart is 300 microns wide, so about four clicks take you from one end of it to the other. That's the gap between the burrs, not the size of every piece, but it shows how little it takes.
When you go finer by a lot, Baratza's advice is to turn the dial with the grinder running. Then grind a few beans and throw them away: the first grounds out are a mix of the old setting and the new one.
That's what makes the Encore ESP the grinder for a chart like this one. Settings 1 to 20 move in small steps for espresso and 21 to 40 in bigger ones for everything from pour-over to French press, so one grinder covers the whole table. One owner pulling shots on a Breville Bambino settled just above 3.
Burr or blade
A burr grinder cracks beans between two toothed steel parts set a fixed distance apart, and the pieces fall out once they're small enough to pass. That's what makes the chart usable: pick a setting, and most of what comes out is close to that size.
A blade grinder is a small propeller. It chops whatever it hits, so the cup gets powder and chunks together, the powder bitter and the chunks sour. There's no setting either: how fine it gets depends on how long you hold the button. If a blade grinder is what you have, time it. AeroPress suggests 30 seconds of steady grinding for its brewer, and Toddy says to grind for three quarters of your drip time for cold brew. It won't match a burr grinder, but one morning will come out closer to the next.
For drip, French press and cold brew under $100, the OXO is where I'd start. It has 15 main settings with small steps in between, and it remembers the last one, so most mornings it's just the button.
No grinder at all
A blender works in a pinch. Pulse it at low speed for a few seconds at a time and check between pulses rather than letting it run, which heats the beans. A food processor works the same way; shake the result through a fine sieve to take out the dust. Failing that, beans in a bag or between two sheets of parchment on a cutting board, crushed with a hammer. All three come out uneven, so save them for a French press or cold brew, where a coarse, rough grind does the least harm.
The easier answer is to buy whole beans and ask the shop to grind them for your brewer. Toddy suggests asking for a French press grind for cold brew.
Grind right before you brew
Ground coffee loses its smell fast. For professional tastings, the SCA wants water on the grounds within 15 minutes of grinding. At home, grind only what you're about to brew and keep the rest as whole beans.
What you need
What you need
- Baratza Encore ESP one electric grinder for every row of the chart, espresso included.$199.95 as of 12:28 PM ET
- Timemore Chestnut C3S Pro a hand grinder with 83-micron clicks, for one mug at a time.$76.00 as of 12:28 PM ET
- OXO Brew Conical Burr Grinder drip, French press and cold brew for under $100.$98.99 as of 12:28 PM ET
- Greater Goods Coffee Scale keeps the dose the same while you change the grind, and times the brew.$29.99 as of 12:28 PM ET
Common questions
What grind is Turkish coffee?
The finest of all, a powder, about 40 to 220 microns by Honest Coffee Guide's chart. Bean Box compares it to powdered sugar. For Turkish coffee you need a grinder made for it; the Encore ESP stops just short, and the grounds stay in the cup either way.
Can I use the same grind for drip and pour-over?
Often, yes. The ranges overlap almost completely: 300 to 900 microns for a drip machine, 400 to 700 for a V60 and 410 to 930 for a Chemex. Start from the same setting and let the taste move you from there.
Why is there sludge at the bottom of my French press?
Fine particles slip through the metal mesh. Either the grind is too fine for the press, or the grinder is making powder along with the coarse pieces, which a blade grinder always does. Go coarser and use a burr grinder.
What grind for iced coffee brewed hot?
When you brew hot coffee straight over ice, Baratza says a medium-fine grind is crucial.
How do I know my grind is too fine?
Every brewer shows it differently. Espresso runs slow and bitter, past about 32 seconds. A moka pot leaves powder at the bottom of the cup. A V60 drains past four minutes. A French press plunger fights you on the way down.
