5 Cup Drip Coffee Maker Machine, One-Touch Pour Over, Auto Pause Brewing with Stainless Steel Double Wall Thermal Carafe, SCA Certified, Dishwasher Safe, BV1500TS

Some of the negative reviews almost caused me to pass on this brewer. I am glad that I decided to buy it, anyway. I am experienced with coffee and brewing methods. I have been drinking specialty coffee for years, have all the equipment, used to roast my own beans, blah blah. I have pourovers, vacuum brewers, and French presses. My go-to brewing method has always been French press. But I was always a bit envious of my son-in-law's Technovorm, which makes a great cup of coffee. I finally decided to break down and get a Technivorm, but when I checked the price I learned that it has gone up by nearly $100. So, I came across this device, and bought it. Here is my review: Coffee quality is excellent, as good as the Technovorm, in my view. One of the criticisms is that this brewer is not SCAA sanctioned, and this concerned me because I was afraid that the brew temperature would be inadequate. Not so. This brewer gets to 200 deg. F. Great cup of coffee. An advantage of this brewer, for me, is that I can make a small pot with no loss of brew quality. I can made 12, 18 or 24 ounce pots and all are great. A lot of times I want just one cup, and because I can make a great 12 ounce pot, I don't waste beans. One complaint I read was that it is confusing to put the brewer into the special, pre-infusion mode. I found this claim to be false. With the machine off, you hold the switch down for five seconds. Now you are in special mode (which I haven't used much), and you stay there until you exit the mode (another five second push) or until you unplug the machine. Nothing could be simpler. In fact the entire operation of the machine is simple, an advantage. Another complaint was poor quality. To me, this device is no better or worse, quality wise, than the Technovorm. Yes it's light weight and has a lot of plastic. So does the Technovorm. This is a good looking machine that will not embarrass you counter top. Another complaint was about how the carafe pours. I think this complaint is fair. The carafe is hard to empty completely and does a poor job of pouring unless the top has been installed. My solution is to use the top whenever I pour. It takes five seconds or less to install (it has a one-turn thread). A final complaint is that there is no warming plate and that the carafe dies not keep the coffee warm long enough. Well, no and yes. No, coffee should never be kept warm on a burner because it creates bitterness, and it does this very rapidly - don't do it, better to microwave it, if needed. Yes, the carafe loses some heat, as it has a lot of surface area. It keeps the coffee plenty hot for me, but I would say that an hour is about it. In summary, this brewer makes an outstanding pot of coffee. The brewer isn't perfect. It is merely great. If there is a better option to brewed coffee at a hundred bucks I don't know what it is.

I got this on an "open box" deal for $66, and for that price it's impossible to beat. For the list price it's still quite good but possibly more difficult to justify. I would say for what I paid, it's a five star product. For the over $100 list price, it's closer to four stars. Read on for my detailed thoughts. I've worked at a few coffee shops, done cuppings with roasters, tried many different brewing techniques, roasted my own beans, etc, so I've definitely tried plenty of good coffee. This coffee is good. When you pay more for a drip machine, you're essentially buying consistency -- water temperature, volume, brew time, where the water is distributed over the grounds, all of these things matter, and make a difference in the flavors that end up in your cup. So while a $10 walmart dripper just indiscriminately dumps some moderately hot water over your precious coffee, a more expensive maker will control these variables with greater and greater precision. It's possible a moccamaster is more precise, but I don't have experience with one. I can say that the coffee the bonavita produces compares favorably with the extremely expensive, top of the line fetco machines (with proprietary spinning showerhead drippers and all the other bells and whistles) we had at the last coffee shop I worked at. I've changed cities since I worked there, so it's difficult to compare apples to apples, since I don't have access to the same beans, but using fairly middle of the road beans I've gotten pleasing results. It's not as good as the godly-est pourovers I've ever had, but it's fairly consistently quite good, doesn't require you to stare lovingly at your hario for 10 minutes, and can brew several cups at once, unlike an aeropress. Changing the volume of beans used and the fineness of the grind yield relatively predictable results, which is a wonderful encouragement for experimentation in search of your personal perfect recipe. To address some of the common complaints: I find the coffee plenty hot when the machine is finished brewing. It's very important to preheat everything before you start brewing, especially since it's a comparatively small volume of hot coffee. I run a two or three cup "blank pot" through the machine to rinse the filter and heat everything up before I brew. It's true, the pot does not keep the coffee hot all day, however I have to say it's just a little ridiculous to expect it to. It's a relatively small volume of liquid (less liquid=less heat retention) in a pot that has a fairly large surface area, including that big, plastic, heat sucking lid. This is part of the reason for the tall, skinny design of the moccamaster, to minimize the surface area of the lid. I've found the bonavita carafe keeps my coffee reasonably hot for a couple hours, which is plenty for me. It might not be the world's best thermal pot but it's also not terrible, and the wider lid makes it easier to clean. For what I paid it's fine. It's got a few plastic parts but what coffee maker for around $100 or less doesn't? I don't know if they changed the design of the carafe since the previous reviewers bought theirs, but I don't experience the problems they've had with pouring without the lid. I wouldn't call it a great pouring experience but it also doesn't make a huge mess as others have complained. It definitely pours better with the lid but if I pour a cup without I don't have any problem. Maybe a drip or two but nothing out of the ordinary. That being said, the complaint about there always beings about a tablespoon of liquid remaining in the carafe is totally true. It doesn't make me crazy, but it is kind of mystifying how I can leave the thing upside down for hours, come back, and there's still a tablespoon of water rolling around in there. I don't think the volume of liquid is enough to affect the quality of the coffee, and if you wanted to you could just dry it out with a towel, but it is a very strange design problem. Bonavita offers a double walled glass carafe replacement that looks beautiful and is probably better than the stock one on most counts, but is rather expensive given the cost of the machine itself. Overall, if you want something approaching consistency and quality from a drip brewer, this is a good choice. Maybe not the world's best, but also not the most expensive. Since I got it for 66, I'm quite happy. But if I had bought it for list price, I might have felt like I would rather have saved some money and just worked on my chemex technique. So at 66, five stars, over 100, four stars.

This machine makes the best cup of coffee you will get from a drip grind. It is rugged and well-made, but has some strange quirks that are annoying. First the good news: It uses a full depth Melitta filter and cone, and heats only an ounce or so of water at a time, so it gives excellent penetration of the ground coffee. It will brew a full pot in less than five minutes. It shuts itself off after brewing. There is no hot plate under the carafe, so you can place the carafe directly onto a counter or table without damage. Some reviewers noted that it is mostly plastic, but it is not the brittle styrene found in cheaper machines. This unit is made of a much stronger and slightly flexible polymer - possibly nylon - that should stand up well. It is also wrapped in stainless steel for added strength and protection. The clear part appears to be glass, but may be a very hard plastic. Now here are the downsides: In order to get the full-depth filter into an under-counter unit, the cone extends into the carafe, so you have to remove the cone promptly after brewing and install the cover on the carafe to keep the coffee hot. You also need to have the cover on when you pour. If you try to pour without the cover, it will slop and dribble all over the counter no matter how careful you are. It pours slowly, which helps to aerate the coffee and make it taste better, but the slow pour could aggravate an impatient user. I also found that the paper filters tend to collapse when sliding the carafe into the machine with the filter cone, no matter how carefully I fold them, so I use a permanent gold filter that I had bought years ago for a Melitta brewer. One last annoyance: you cannot pour the last ounce or two out of the carafe; you can only replace it with water, then sponge it out - or just leave it in. If you pre-heat the stainless steel carafe, brew a full pot, and install the cover immediately after brewing, it will keep a full pot above 160 degrees for two hours or more. It the pot is not full, however, it will cool much faster. For me and my housemate, it works fine, as she likes to wait awhile after waking before having her coffee, while I want mine right away. As others have noted, it keeps the coffee above 160 degrees for at least an hour. All said, I am very pleased with this machine. Despite its annoying quirks, it makes wonderful coffee.

I am not a coffee snob. I drink it with milk. I use Folgers decaf. I refuse to grind my own beans. I prefer to let billion-dollar multinational corporations do the grinding for me. I used to plop three heaping tablespoons of Folgers into a cut-open plastic jug and pour my reverse-osmosis filtered water over it. Then I put it my microwave for 14 minutes. I drained the coffee through a Brawny paper towel into a 30oz Balfor thermal mug I got on Amazon. OK, so a bit savage and feral, but I didn't want to be a total suburbanite with a coffee machine. The Bonavita BV1500TS brews in one-third the time. I bought one of those gold-tone permanent filters so no drinking paper residue. I was delighted to see Bonavita is thoughtful enough to put a 4-pack of filters in the box, so I didn't have to wait for the permanent filter to arrive. I was sure my low-temperature microwave method would be less bitter, but it was the exact opposite. The Bonavita made perfect coffee, and it was my goofy old method that made the coffee taste bad. There is a review on CNET, "Bonavita BV1500TS review: A high-end brand's step-down coffeemaker brews with bitter results," by Brian Bennett. He claims this model makes bitter coffee. He also says he loves the 8-cup model. He notes that he tested with a very touchy coffee known to be bitter. I almost bought the bigger unit based on this. I am so glad I didn't. The coffee I made today was the best-tasting, smoothest, most delicious coffee I have ever had anywhere. I disagree completely with Bennett's review. Maybe it is outdated. Maybe he got a bad unit. Maybe he did not run three carafes through the unit in preparation, as the directions tell you to. Maybe he got the coffee maker on a grumpy day. As an engineer, I can see that the water delivery system needs to cool the water down from boiling before it drips on the grounds. Maybe Bennett left the lid open or blocked the vents or tested in a hot or cold warehouse. All I know is he is dead wrong. His testing was not double-blind, so I don't put much credence in it. The unit came in a couple days, even with regular (not Prime) free shipping. It was delivered on Saturday despite saying it would be Monday. Yeah Amazon. The unit was well-packed, and had a decent little manual included. As noted, I loved they put in 4 filters, although the gold-tone filter came today too, but only after I made the first cup. OK, its fast, and fantastic coffee, and its small and compact. The bad is that while it brews in minutes, you have to wait for the water to drain past the coffee after it stops brewing. No different than any other machine, I suppose. There is a plastic lip inside the stainless steel carafe so it never drains completely. No problem, one factor in getting this one versus the 8-cup model is that there is a glass double-wall thermal carafe available for this model. Its 30 bucks, here on Amazon. I will suffer with the stainless carafe until I do a "treat yo'self" to the glass one. I did love how the top screws onto the carafe, with perfect registration and a lever to open carafe drain. It does have a very restricted flow out of the carafe. Come on Bonavita. This is a drug delivery system. We want it fast. I did not notice any leaking or dripping problems as some others have noted. After I made the three conditioning pots, for the actual first coffee I did not bother to screw on the top. I just poured directly into my 30oz Balfor thermal mug, then added the milk. The perfect temperature of the coffee made it taste even better. This was after adding milk however. No, this is not a shill review. I bought it with my own Social Security money here in the Florida retirement community. I am just so used to being disappointed with products, it was great to get one that exceeded my every expectation. Best yet, I save wear and tear on my old analog commercial microwave, a Sharp R-6300. Search Google for Sharp R-6300 and you can read an article I wrote years ago about that great unit. Next up is a tea-maker I also ordered from Amazon. I hope its as good as this product. Its another way to reduce the usage of my microwave, which I consider irreplaceable. I got so worked up writing this, it occurs to me there is no reason I can't make a second pot tonight, its decaf after all. Now I get to try the paperless filter, yippee. [Update, Oct 2021, four years later.] I still love this coffeemaker. I not only have used it every day, I have taken to brewing tea in it, so that means I use it more than twice a day on average. A family-sized tea bag makes 5 cups, four brews fills the gallon jugs I used to buy at the supermarket. Way cheaper, I can make decaf or caffeinated tea, and no artificial sugar or high prices. I love that it just takes one button press, no "features". I don't want to program a computer with every product I use, I just want to press a button and have it brew and turn off automatically. I don't want a heater under the carafe. I had to buy two more double-walled glass carafes. One I dropped. Good thing, since its pour spout was hand-firmed and way too tiny, it was nearly impossible to pour without dribbling coffee down the side. The second was not properly sealed so condensation formed inside. There is a little glass nipple on the bottom where they are supposed to seal it off, and that was not sealed. The handle is two small as well, but it kinda works. My review for that will be "Italian style, Italian quality." I came back here today since I am considering buying a second one, since I don't want to go a day without the machine, when the first one wears out. I did learn that some people credit the cone filter with better coffee. Oh, I gave up on the permanent filter, it left little grounds in the coffee. I just use a #4 cone filter from Publix. They are cheap and work great.

I used to have their previous coffee maker from around 2012 which had a glass carafe and was ranked highly so I figured when that one broke I’d buy this version since I loved it. Big mistake and waste of money. It takes more time to clean and the coffee (so many pieces to clean) and it tastes worse because it’s tainted by the steel carafe. Then to make it worse I can’t just pour the coffee after it’s done but need to wash the top and put it on first. The top is so leaky, after a year of use it’s unusable and leaks everywhere. When I say leak, I mean a lot. Never buying from them again, got one year out of this and it’s not worth trying to fix it. I’d rather buy a new one. Disappointed. My wife bought it as a gift, so it won’t show me as verified buyer here.

Starting out liking it a lot. With a cold pot serve temp is 180 -185F, with a hot pot 190-195F. With the #4 cone filter it allows for me to get more coffee in my brew. I like my coffee strong at about 38g coffee to 600ml water. My pot does not leak or drip right after pouring. In case you are wondering the 5 cup mark for the water is 750ml and each cup is 150ml. As soon as it arrived I unboxed, loaded a filter, and started brewing cold filtered tap water with a cold pot. After measuring the results poured out the water and added new cold filtered water. Then brewed 3 more cycles without grounds measuring the results with a hot starting pot and basically cleaning the unit also. Once done I brewed two 4 cup pots about 3 hours apart thoroughly enjoying them, all stats were consistent with the above numbers. A point to be aware of is the shower head will have some condensate water in it after a brew that ,at least in mine, did not drip out. I had to tip it forward and give it alittle shake to get it to drip out. This is likely not an issue for those with somewhat dry environments and use clean water but otherwise a good idea to get that out each time. Will update... ...a few days later 3/13/22 The carafe is the only real problem with it's retention and the thermal ability is low quality in general. My Yeti travel mug is much better. The reason I picked a thermal carafe brewer was because I did not want a hot plate under the carafe. So I am switching to a glass carafe. I have a Hario style 700ml borosilicate glass server which works but not great. I have 2 more on order I will picture once I test them. Will update... 10-07-22 Sorry I can't really help with the glass carafe since what I ended up using is not being sold anymore. But I have discoverd why some have rust issues. It is directly connected to over filling the water reservoir. As soon as you get about 4mm over the 5 cup MAX mark. Water will slowly leak into the center tube with the hot water line heading to the showerhead over the basket. Not into the hot line but around it leading right down to the heater coil. I noticed this the first time I decalcified the unit. Becuase I over filled it by just enough to see the drips going down the center tube. Mine leaked enough to puddle under it but if the over fill was not as much I could see the inside getting wet but not puddling. Then just rusting over time. Not a defect as long as you follow the directions. Other than finding this the experince with the unit has been great and I am happy with the purchase and suggest it to others. 03-08-23 I found an ok glass carafe but it does not work with the original basket. I bought the Technivorm 13192 Manual Brew Basket. Which also uses the same filter but adds the manual flow control. It is now the best steep and release single cup brewer. My single cup starts with 400gm of water and 21gm-23gm of coffee. I also run it in the pre-infusion mode(blinking light). Since it is still working like a champ with no rust I can find and it lets me brew what I like. I have bumped it up to a full 5 stars. Compared to other 5 cup brewers. Carafe: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000TCVXAU/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 Mug: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08TWBW5KG/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I have had three Bonavita machines over the past 15 years or so. Two 8 cup models, and one 5 cup. All are to my taste in that they don't have always on lights, are extremely simple to use, make coffee fast, and well...the best I've tasted from a drip machine. I want my coffee to do only one thing, make coffee. I do not want it to make sounds, tell time, or light up. All of the Bonavita's did everything that I wanted, within reason, except last for a long time. These machines will shut down on you if you don't clean them on a regular basis by using a coffee cleaner. It took me a while to figure that out, but once I did, it extended the life cycle of the latest incarnation to 5+ years. Unfortunately, it is now starting to shut down halfway through the brew cycle even though I have cleaned it recently, and multiple times at that. I find myself in the market, once again, for a coffee maker. I tend to get attached to tools that serve me well. I still have my original 1982 Milwaukee Sawzall and circa 1970's black handled Sandvik chisels. It bothers me that the Bonavita, which checks so many boxes for me, cannot fix this shutdown problem(and it will shutdown on you if you don't clean it, sometimes within months). I would happily(ok, maybe grumpily) buy another if they could convince me that they have once and for all dealt with this issue. Update. I bought another Bonavita, a 5 cup model this time. Everything was great for the couple of weeks or so, then I noticed that there was a swishing sound of liquid even when the inside of the carafe was bone dry. Coffee also started to taste bad, with a metallic taste, which leads me to believe that there is a leak in the carafe liner, trapping liquid between it and the metal outside. I've had this happen before on thermal coffee mugs. It would just be an annoyance that I would put up with, if it wasn't my suspicion that I have rusty coffee water(eww..) leaking back into my brew. The coffee now tastes bad, and I am using the same beans I always do. New Edit; Just speculating, but I think that the leak must be where the plastic top section with the handle joins with the inner and outer carafe. Must be a pour seal that leaks when coffee is poured. I've always had the thermal carafes... this problem would go away if I had the glass carafe version, I would imagine. One other minor thing about this unit that is subpar is that the volume lines are near impossible to read they are so faint. I've just resorted to remarking them with a Magic Marker. This unit is a great idea, and makes great coffee(till it doesn't), but the attention to detail is lacking - it's a shame. I have revised my rating from a 4 star, to a 2 star. This is unacceptable. Hate to say it, as I have had a long history with this company, but I am near done.

I've had both Bonavita's on my Amazon wish list for months to watch the price action and learn the range. Ultimately I decided on the 5 cup vs. the 8 cup based on footprint size and that 5 cups would work most of the time for my needs. Bonavita is on all the expert's lists for really good coffee makers - and priced accordingly. The features they tout are that they consistently deliver the recommended brewing temperature @ 195-205 F, simplicity and an excellent designed flow head to best immerse the coffee with the hot water. YouTube is full of very well-done videos about the whys of best coffee makers, so worth a look if you are debating. This small cup Bonavita is most often listed @ $145 or so. Watching Amazon I eventually paid $95 - so that worked for me. I like SIMPLE and this is SIMPLE. Just open the lid to the water reservoir, add grounds and press the button. It is also fast. The thermal carafe works well keeping your 2nd cup warm. Thermal carafes are a big deal in the professional reviewers I read/watched because they don't scold the coffee like the hot plates and glass carafes. It comes with an auto off button unlike my Zojirushi which, even with practice, I forget to turn off - so I like that. Coffee - I'm not much of an expert, but I do like the taste but taste is so individual better to read other's reviews. Footprint is good on the 5 cup as I debated about the 8 cup but that is significantly taller and I have cupboards over my counter so the height and overall footprint were important to me - I'm happy with the relative economy of the 5 cup machine. The smaller size makes it easier to operate. There are some annoyances that YouTube reviewers will warn you about. The design flaw I don't understand is that you WILL have coffee left in the carafe. The design is such that it just will not empty which means it will stain up and leave the bitter residue in your carafe which everyone tries to avoid with coffee. Swapping out the carafe top from making to pouring is a pain - which is well-documented by all the serious reviewers. So if you want a swallow while the coffee is brewing - forget it - there is no "stop & pour" function like is standard on most other makers. However the most commonly cited negative on this maker goes away if you are careful on Amazon - price. This is a pricey unit, but I like mine a lot better at $95 than $145. So this is a variable you can control and will make you more tolerant of any other negatives you find on this machine. Good luck! ---------------------------- After a month I'm modifying my review & deducting a star on the rating. It doesn't come with a heating plate & a big selling point was the quality keep-warm carafe. Not so - it really doesn't do much, certainly not the 2 hours some of the product reviews & claims I read talked about. Also, the complicated routine of having to screw the top on to the carafe after brewing in order to pour a cup has gotten old quickly. If you just make a cup for yourself you must screw the pour top on to pour, then immediately screw it off to wash. Really not fun. So, I'm now a reluctant 3 star reviewer.