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When the Keurig single-cup coffee maker was first developed some 30 years ago, even its inventors couldn’t envision what a game-changer this appliance would be. As co-creator John Sylvan told CBC in a 2015 interview, he was primarily envisioning the K-Cup system as something that would be used in offices. He described himself as being “absolutely mystified” by the fact that it subsequently took off in the home market. While Sylvan may prefer to stick with a multi-cup maker, Keurig fans know the real secret behind this multi-billion-dollar brand’s enduring popularity: These brewers turn our morning coffee into a fun little ritual and give us the option to switch up our brew with each cup we make.
While there are numerous other single-serve coffee makers on the market these days, Keurig is still an industry leader. At the time of publication, seven of the top ten best-selling single-serve coffee brewers on Amazon are Keurig machines. Even within the brand itself, there is a wide variety of models from which to choose. To decide which one is best for you, we’ve selected the top Keurig machines for every purpose.
When it comes to choosing the best of the best coffee makers in general, or even narrowing that field down to single-serve ones, we’re kind of spoiled for choice. This guide is brand-specific so that in itself limits our selection. What’s more, we are only listing machines that Keurig is currently featuring on its website and also has available through its own Amazon storefront. This means that we’re not going to be discussing any prior-year models that may still be available via third-party vendors.
As for the methodology behind our selection, we first went through the features and descriptions of all the different machines so we could pinpoint the special strengths of each model. What follows is a selection of Keurigs to best fit your circumstances, whether you live in a tiny house or are looking to supply the beverage needs of an entire office. We’re also covering specialty Keurigs that go beyond the standard cup of coffee, as well as models that can be customized to fit your home decor.
If you live in an apartment, have a small kitchen, or have a tendency to collect kitchen gadgets, then counter space may be at a premium. The K-Mini Plus, as its name implies, is the smallest coffeemaker that Keurig has to offer at less than 5 inches in width, and it’s also one of the least expensive models. Yet another fun fact about the K-Mini Plus: Keurig bills it as being the greenest of its machines, since it incorporates the highest amount of recycled plastic. If you’re thinking green as in color, it does indeed come in both a pale green and a teal shade, as well as aqua, red, gray, white, and black.
Slim as the K-Mini may be, it nevertheless incorporates storage space for nine K-Cups in its design, a feature that could also free up a little counter or pantry space. The K-Mini will brew a standard 6 to 12-ounce cup, although there is a removable drip tray in case you want to fit a tallish travel mug under there. While you do have to refill the reservoir every time you brew a cup, at least you’ll know the water is fresh rather than sitting in the tank for a few days.
Purchase the K-Mini Plus from Amazon starting at $108.99 as of August 2022.
If the hardest part of brewing your coffee in the morning is the agonizingly long wait for the water to heat and then drip through the grounds, then the K-Express is the machine you need. True to its name, it brews coffee at super speed. Don’t believe us? Take it from this satisfied Keurig customer who claims: “My coffee is ready in 30 seconds.” (They weren’t the only ones to praise the machine’s speedy delivery, either.) It also has a feature called “back-to-back brewing,” which means that you can brew a second cup right away with no need to wait for the water to reheat.
The K-Express has a 42-ounce reservoir (that’s 5 ¼ cups, for the math averse) and it offers the ability to choose between 8, 10, and 12-ounce cups. This machine also has a removable drip tray that allows taller mugs to fit. If there’s one drawback to the K-Express it’s that it only comes in basic black, but if that’s your preferred color and you don’t need every last bell and whistle, then this machine is a pretty solid performer.
Purchase the K-Express from Amazon for $79.99 as of August 2022.
Keurig built its name on the K-Cup system, so what’s the deal with multi-cup Keurigs? If you’re confused by the idea, you’re not alone. As K-cup creator Sylvan told CBC, his first reaction to seeing a multi-cup Keurig back in 2015 was “You have to be kidding me.” However, this type of machine offers versatility. If you live in a household where sometimes only one person wants coffee, while at other moments you want to brew a few cups simultaneously, it’s kind of a pain to switch from a single-cup brewer to a carafe one. The K-Duo Plus, however, allows you to change over from one mode to the next with a single appliance.
The K-Duo Plus is all about options. In single cup mode, it allows you to choose between 6, 8, 10, and 12-ounce cups, while the carafe can hold up to 12 cups. No need for a paper filter either, as this brewer comes with a reusable one to fit the carafe. Multi-cup mode also allows for programming 24 hours ahead of brew time, and once the brewing is under way, you can even pause the action to pour a cup before the carafe is full. The machine comes in basic black, the carafe is stainless steel, and as an added feature, the 60-ounce water reservoir can be attached to either side or in the back.
Purchase the K-Duo Plus from Amazon for $184.80 as of August 2022.
While millennials have been blamed for killing everything from casual dining to mayonnaise, apparently Gen-Z has taken over as trend enders-in-chief. Directly in its headlights is –- gasp! — coffee. Well, not coffee in general, just hot coffee. Still, that’s bad news for the coffee-maker industry, isn’t it? Not if they’re as quick to pivot as Keurig has been. The company added a “brew over ice” feature to several of its machines including the K-Supreme and K-Elite. Our pick of the litter is the K-Slim + ICE, which clearly highlights the function in its name.
As you’d expect of a brewer called the K-Slim, this coffee maker is less than 5 inches wide, just perfect for those Gen-Z dorm rooms and tiny starter apartments. Yet, it manages to fit a 46-ounce water reservoir. While the machine still brews hot coffee (8, 10, or 12 ounces), the real selling point is the iced coffee feature. The brewing starts out super hot to make the coffee strong but then cools off so it won’t come out too hot and melt all the ice. You’ll get 6 ounces of coffee, which is enough to fill a tall glass. Best of all, the amount of time from start to end is about two minutes, making the K Slim + ICED one of the quickest ways to prepare iced coffee.
Purchase the K-Slim + ICED from Amazon for $99.99 as of August 2022.
Back in the olden days, PS (pre-Starbucks), coffee was pretty much just coffee, with an exotic beverage like a cappuccino a special option at trendy coffeehouses or perhaps at an old-school Italian restaurant of the checkered tablecloth variety. Now, however, coffee drinks such as lattes, cappuccinos, and such are far more popular with coffee shop patrons than a plain old cup o’ joe. If you’ve developed a serious coffee shop habit, however, you’re well aware of what a chunk they take out of your budget, but what can you do? Don’t you need a bunch of fancy machinery to make your favorite drinks, not to mention a master’s degree from Barista U?
Nope and nope, at least not if you’ve got Keurig’s K-Cafe. While it’s not a professional-grade espresso maker by any means, the K-Cafe makes simple work out of DIY coffee creations. It not only brews 8, 10, and 12-ounce cups, but it also has a “shot” setting for extra-strong coffee concentrate. The detachable frother can produce hot or cold foam from cream or milk. Plus, you can pop the frother in the dishwasher afterward for easy clean-up. While the K-Cafe is one of Keurig’s pricier home models, the cost is equivalent to maybe a month’s worth of coffee shop lattes, and numerous satisfied customers say it’s both easy and fun to use.
Purchase the K-Cafe from Amazon for $164.99 as of August 2022.
If you’re in charge of purchasing supplies for your office or managing the type of small business with a waiting room, then you know how much people appreciate a communal coffee pot. A standard carafe machine, however, means that someone has to keep refilling the basket, emptying out the grounds, and ensuring the coffee doesn’t sit on the warmer until it burns down to sludge. Keurig’s solution for all of these problems is the industrial-strength K155 Office Pro.
The Office Pro is a single-cup brewer, but it has a generous 90-ounce water reservoir which means that only the unlucky 10th user will need to refill it. In addition to the 10-ounce setting, users also have the option to select stronger, smaller, 8, 6, or 4-ounce brews. The brew size is selected via touch screen, which according to Tom’s Guide, features a display of images of coffee being harvested as you wait for your cup to brew. Plus, if you know the secret (press the button for 10 seconds), you can also use that touchscreen to set the brew temperature, clock, language, and auto-shutoff functions. While the Office Pro is much pricier than most home Keurig models, customer reviews praise its ability to stand up to heavy use for years at a time.
Purchase the K155 Office Pro from Amazon for $294.95 as of August 2022.
The Keurig K-Classic combines a cute retro look with up-to-date Keurig functionality. In appearance, it’s strikingly similar to the vintage B40, a Keurig model that was new back in the 20-tweens (as per this 2012 YouTube review).
This is a no bells and whistles machine, as it lacks the option to brew over ice, a milk frother, programmability, and various other features common to some other models mentioned on this list. If you just want a basic cup of coffee — your choice of 6, 8, and 10 ounces — with a moderate-sized water reservoir (48 ounces), then you may well appreciate the simplicity of the design and the ease of use. The K-Classic also offers a color choice of black and rhubarb in case you want to add a splash of color to your kitchen decor.
Purchase the K-Classic from Amazon for $99.99 as of August 2022.
One of the various complaints that non-Keurig fans have about coffee pod brewers is that the coffee doesn’t come out as strong as they’d like. Over the years, people have derived various hacks meant to strengthen the brew, but having to go through procedures like grinding your own beans and double-cupping kind of defeats the purpose of the easy one-touch coffee-making experience.
Keurig finally came up with its own solution, available on select models including the K-Elite: a strong brew feature. According to Tom’s Guide, the function works by slowing down the brewing process so that more of the coffee essence can infuse the water as it drips through.
The strong button isn’t the only special feature available on the K-Elite, though. You also have the option to adjust the temperature from 187 to 192 F, and the machine can brew over ice. It has a generous 75-ounce reservoir, and the time it takes to brew a cup is less than a minute. This particular model even alerts you when you need to de-scale it. As for aesthetics, it’s quite attractive in a sleek minimalist way with its straight, slightly tapering lines and choice of slate, gold, and silver metallic finishes.
Purchase the K-Elite from Amazon starting at $135.99 as of August 2022.
Do you love your coffee maker but hate all the racket it makes? Keurig’s K-Select could be the answer for those mornings when you just want to tell the world to pipe down until you’ve managed to knock back that first cup. As Home Grounds notes in its review of this model, the Quiet Brew technology that Keurig employs here makes the K-Select among its quietest models, or, indeed, of all single-cup brewers.
Apart from its silent aspect, the K-Select also has a range of other features found on pricier Keurigs, including a de-scaling reminder, a water filter, and — Coloradans take note! — a setting that can optimize it for high-altitude use. One aspect we particularly like is its fingerprint-resistant exterior as well as the fact that it comes in a choice of black, white, red, sandstone (beige), navy, and a light aqua blue called oasis.
Purchase the K-Select from Amazon starting at $118.49 as of August 2022.
While not all smart kitchen appliances are as convenient as they’re cracked up to be, the K-Supreme Plus® SMART actually seems to live up to the hype. What makes it so smart is the fact that you can communicate with it via the Keurig app or a voice recognition device such as Alexa to start or schedule your brewing remotely. That means you can have a cup waiting when you get home from work or step out of the shower. You can also adjust your brew settings and even use the smart re-order function to make sure you never run out of K-Cups.
Apart from its smart technology, the K-Supreme Plus has a few more tricks up its sleeve. You can create and save 10 different settings, choosing from five sizes (ranging from 4 to 12 ounces), six temperatures (warm to max hot), and five strengths (balanced to intense). It also uses a multi-stream technology to uniformly saturate the grounds and can detect the optimum settings for different K-cups as recommended by the coffee roaster. What’s more, this machine sends maintenance alerts for everything from de-scaling to filter changes. The water reservoir holds 78 ounces, and the back-to-back brewing technology means no wait time before you start on that second cup. The K-Supreme Plus even offers a choice of finishes: black and stainless steel.
Purchase the K-Supreme Plus® SMART from Amazon starting at $189.99 as of August 2022.
If you’re more into form than function, you may find yourself leaning toward Keurig models that offer a wider choice of colors, since it’s always fun to have an appliance that doesn’t look like every other coffee maker out there. If you really want a device that will stand out or even something that is truly one-of-a-kind, Keurig offers brewers that come with striped, dotted, and floral patterns. There are even two holiday designs: one with a Christmas sweater pattern and the other with reindeer and snowflakes. The K-Mini, K-Mini Plus, and K-Slim models are among those available for customization.
While not every pattern can be selected for all three brewers we mentioned, Keurig’s website allows you to choose whether you want to start with a particular design or pick your preferred model and see which designs are available for each. Once you’ve chosen your design, you have the option to personalize it by selecting colors other than the ones shown in the example and even adding your own text. You can also choose whether to opt for artwork on both sides and the top or whether to leave any of these areas unadorned. If you have a hard time making up your mind, creating a Keurig account will allow you to log in and save several different custom designs until you finally decide which one to order.
Purchase a custom brewer from Keurig starting at $109.99 as of August 2022.