Philips Barista Brew Semi Automatic Espresso Machine - Single & Double Espresso + Americano Button, 250g Bean Container, Intuitive Guidance, Calibrated Tamping, Metal Black (PSA3218/10)

Had this for a week now, first time buyer so can’t compare to other machines. Easy to unpack and set up, choice of expresso, double expresso or americano, with a milk frother allowing you to make several types of coffee. We used Costco beans in the integrated grinder which is also easy to understand and use. Takes a few goes to set up grinding volume, fineness of the grind and getting the tamper right. We set the temperature to maximum also but tastes as good as if not better than a shop made coffee in our opinion. Expect that aficionados can find fault but we can’t. One thing to note we bought this on Black Friday at a very good price and it then took 3 months to arrive and only then because I threatened to sue Amazon. This involved multiple calls to them, exposing their support staff as liars and refusing the offered refund as the machine would have cost us a lot more elsewhere.

This machine is great as a first entry into esspresso machines. Is it the best machine on the market? No Does it have the greatest variety of felxibility and customisation on the market? No Does it make great coffee and give you a BRILLIANT entry into the wonderful world of esspresso and coffe? YES YES YES YES The hopper holds a very good ammount of beans that does 5+ coffees per fill. The multiple baskets that it comes with are great for dialling in your espresso and make it nearly impossible to make bad coffee. The calibrated tamper makes it easy to get the correct pressure for your puck and if youre a fan of milk drinks, the inbuilt frother gives great pressure and the accompanying milk jug allows for easy pouring. Overall this is a brilliant "First" esspresso machine that blends great coffee with ease of use and flexible settings whilst also being very hard to get wrong. As a final note, I had a small issue with the hopper after about 4 weeks of near constant use, and all it took was 5 minutes and 3 small screws to get the whole thing apart, fix and put back together. I really cannot reccoment this machine enough.

Bought this at a great price, had read reviews where the grinder wasn’t great & was messy. Still ordered as it was great value. Got to say though that I haven’t had any major problems. No static with the grinder at all. It took me a while experimenting to get the ideal settings but I was soon grinding, tamping & hitting the optimal pressure using the single walled basket. Similarly with the milk wand. After a day or 2 I now froth great milk. I’ve found the machine to be excellent, the coffee is fantastic & if you’re willing to be patient & learn the necessary skills it’s very rewarding & they don’t take that long to master.

My pressure never gets to the “optimal range” I’ve tried lots of variations of grind size/grind amount/tamper pressure and it doesn’t change so I’m unsure if there is a fault but the coffee still tastes ok to me as an amateur

So i bought one of these having had all sage machines previously. I'm a pretty heavy user and usually get 5 years or so out of the sage machines. For some bizarre reason I thought I would have a change and try this machine, MISTAKE! To look at it's a nice unit, makes a decent espresso and I would say is aimed at beginners as has weighted tamper, timed steam wand etc etc. The machines weakness is the steam wand. Literally a few days after the 30 day refund period it stopped working. I always look after my machines so run after use, clean etc so it's not that. I paid 529 for this machine, and you don't expect it to break 7 weeks in!! I have to say amazon as ever we're great and will refund me but obviously I'm back to square one. My advice would be avoid this machine and buy the Sage.

This is my first semi-automatic coffee machine. The machine is sturdy and well-built, and it makes excellent espresso. However, adjusting the extraction pressure is a bit tricky, and when grinding the coffee, a lot of coffee grounds tend to scatter around. I hope I’ll get the hang of it soon!

This easy to set up and easy to clean coffee machine was great value for money. It has preset options as well as DIY options.

Lovely machine