Breville
Precision Brewer Thermal Coffee Maker
About the product
A versatile coffee maker with a no-drip design
Breville is a high-end manufacturer of coffee machines, and the Breville Precision Brewer Thermal coffee maker is certainly that. After putting it through its paces in the BestReviews Testing Lab, we were particularly impressed by its seven brew settings that deliver consistently delicious coffee, no matter if it’s a quick single serving or a full 60-ounce carafe.
Its other features are similarly well performing. For instance, if you remove the carafe mid-brew, it can automatically pause the brewing without any drips falling onto the hot plate. It’s a significant investment, though, so we’d recommend double-checking whether you think you’d use all its capabilities. If the answer is no, consider a more affordable machine.
What is the Breville Precision Brewer?
The Breville Precision Brewer Thermal is a high-end, highly variable drip coffee maker. It has seven brew settings, including Cold Brew and Over Ice. All of its brew settings result in delicious coffee, though we found the difference between the settings to be minimal. It can also make variable amounts of coffee, from one cup to a full 60-ounce carafe.
The carafe is equally impressive. We tested how well it maintained the temperature of the coffee, and it took a whopping six hours for it to fall from a starting point of 185 degrees to 145 degrees. However, we had issues with the lid. Sometimes it wouldn’t pour well, so we had to remove the lid entirely to pour our coffee.
Regardless of the settings you choose, controlling the appliance is exceptionally easy. It has a small but bright, easy-to-read screen that displays several options at a time, and you twist and press a knob to access all the settings. A Start/Cancel button prevents you from accidentally starting the brewing before you’re ready.
Pros
- It includes many brew settings, including hot and cold coffees, that all delivered delicious results during testing.
- The thermal carafe maintained the coffee temperature far better than the average coffee maker.
- We found the controls and screen to be very easy to use.
Cons
- The carafe can be finicky. Sometimes it poured easily; other times barely at all.
- It uses all the water in the reservoir every time it brews, so you can’t fill it and make several small cups over time.
A closer look at the Cold Brew functionality
The Cold Brew option on the Breville Precision Brewer is more precise than that on other drip coffee makers we tested. You can set the steeping time of the beans to as short as five minutes or as long as 24 hours, though you’re limited to making up to 20 ounces at a time. We tested it using an hour of steeping time, and the coffee tasted a little stronger and smoother than the coffee brewed using the hot and iced coffee settings.
A closer look at the versatility
Besides Cold Brew, this Breville machine can make iced coffee, has three kinds of hot coffee settings, a Pour Over setting and a hot coffee My Brew setting that is fully customizable.
- Over Ice: This setting required double the usual suggested amount of beans (two scoops per serving instead of one). The result had good strength and aroma. We also tested it using the standard one scoop per serving suggested for the other brew settings and found it tasteless and mostly pure water. Definitely follow the instructions.
- Fast: Using this setting resulted in a decently strong cup of coffee with a nice flavor and great aroma.
- Gold: This option delivered a weaker cup with less flavor and a barely detectable aroma. We’d suggest using 1.5 or 2 times the amount of beans for this setting.
- Strong: This one didn’t deliver much aroma at all, but it had a much deeper flavor than the other settings.
- My Brew: When you want to brew coffee precisely to your taste, this setting lets you set the bloom time of the beans, the brewing temperature and the flow rate of the water. It also remembers these settings so you can quickly and easily brew a similar pot of coffee. However, we found that no matter what we tweaked, the differences between the results were minimal. Only people with very refined palates will appreciate this option.
- Pour Over: Many say that pour-over coffee is more flavorful than drip, so this machine gives you that option if you prefer. However, we did not test this setting because it requires a Pour Over adapter that’s purchased separately or included as part of a bundle with the Precision Brewer.
Who is it for?
The Breville Precision Brewer Thermal is designed for the coffee enthusiast who likes to adjust and tweak brew settings to get exactly the cup of coffee they want and who like to enjoy both hot and cold coffee. It’s also ideal for large households or offices where each person has a preferred way to brew their coffee.
How we tested the Breville Precision Brewer
- Hot coffee settings: This Breville has three ways to make coffee, and we made a pot of each to compare their tastes and aromas.
- Cold coffee settings: You can also make coffee over ice or as a cold brew. Like hot coffee, we made a pot of each to taste and compare.
- My Brew: To test the Breville’s customizable brew setting, we made three pots: one with all settings at low, one with all settings at medium and one with all settings at high. We compared them against each other and against the other three hot coffee brewing settings.
- Thermal carafe: To test how well the carafe maintained the temperature of the coffee, we made a full pot on the Gold setting. We then took a baseline temperature reading immediately after the brewing finished and then every half hour for six hours. The baseline was 185 degrees and it fell by 5 to 10 degrees every hour until it reached 145 degrees after six hours.
We also considered how easy it was to use, clean and maintain by comparing it to other drip coffee makers we’ve tested and used in our daily lives.
Price and where to buy
The Breville Precision Brewer Thermal retails for $329.95. You can find it on Amazon and Best Buy.
Features deep dive
We’ve looked at most of this Breville’s excellent features, but there are a few more we want to mention.
Automatic start
Like most mid-range and better drip coffee makers, you can program this Breville to start brewing at a specific time. Never again will you have to try to make coffee in the morning while half asleep.
Hard-water adjustment
There is a setting on this coffee maker that lets you input the hardness of your water to slow or prevent scaling. It even comes with a hard-water testing strip so you can be as precise as possible.
Dishwasher-safe cleaning
Most of the parts on this Breville, including the filter basket, reusable filter and the parts of the carafe, are safe to put in the dishwasher.
How does it compare to other coffee machines we tested?
The Breville Precision Brewer Thermal is similar to the other drip coffee makers we tested in a few ways, including the body design and general brewing process. It distinguishes itself with the many brew settings, easy-to-use controls and a screen that makes it easy to see what you’re doing. It also made slightly better coffee than some of the other more affordable machines we also enjoyed using, such as the OXO Brew 9-Cup Coffee Maker and the Ninja CP307 Hot and Cold Brewed System.
Should you get a Breville Precision Brewer?
The Breville Precision Brewer is a big investment for home brewers. It’s nice to have so many brewing settings and features, but they’ll all go to waste if you like to make the same cup of coffee day in and day out. If that’s you, this machine is simply too costly. If you like to shake things up, though, we’d say there’s hardly a better drip brewer out there.
If you’re looking for a new drip coffee maker for your office break room, it’s much easier to suggest this one. The various settings mean everyone can make their ideal cup of coffee, and the screen and simple controls make it easy for everyone to get their java fix quickly and easily.