How to Make AeroPress Coffee: Recipe, Ratio, and Best Beans
Search "AeroPress recipe" and you'll find a hundred of them. Inverted method. Bypass water. Competition recipes with six pours, three stirs, and a note about swirling at exactly 1:47. Recipes calling for 175°F water, recipes calling for boiling water, recipes that have you pressing for two full minutes.
They can't all be right, and the noise has convinced a lot of people that the AeroPress is complicated.
It isn't. It's one of the most forgiving brewers I own, and that's the actual reason to use one (along with it being super light and travel-able, whether on a plane, in the office, or at a campsite in the Upper Peninsula. More on that later).
This guide covers one method: standard orientation, one pour, with no tricks… plus where this brewer actually earns its spot in your cabinet.
Plus, which coffees taste best through it.
Like any brew method, the taste comes down to extraction, which is determined by:
brew device
brew recipe
grind size
water temperature
brew time
dilution (coffee to water ratio)
and, of course, COFFEE!
Part one: Why the AeroPress is so forgiving (you don’t have to be a pro)
Two things are working in your favor, and they're worth understanding because they tell you what you're allowed to be sloppy about.
It's an immersion brewer. The coffee sits in the water for a set amount of time, like a French press or a cold brew. Compare that to a V60, where your grind size and your pouring technique determine how long water actually spends in the coffee bed. Pour badly on a V60 and your brew time swings by a minute, and the cup swings with it. In an AeroPress, 90 seconds is 90 seconds no matter how you poured it.
You control the finish. The plunger pushes water out when you decide. Nothing stalls and nothing runs away from you. If a V60 clogs, you stand there watching it drip and there's nothing you can do about it. An AeroPress just asks for a little more shoulder.
So the two variables that ruin most pour-overs — grind size and drawdown time — matter much less here. Get in the neighborhood and you'll get a good cup. That's a rare thing in coffee gear, and it's why this is the brewer I hand to people who tell me they're bad at making coffee.
Paper vs. metal filters
The AeroPress comes with paper filters, and that's what I use. Paper traps more oils and fines, giving you a cleaner, brighter cup, which is what I want from the coffees we roast.
Metal filters (sold separately, by a bunch of third parties) let more oils and particulates through. Think: heavier body, more texture, a little muddier. Some people love it. It's basically the same trade-off as a Hario cold brewer with a mesh filter versus a Toddy with a paper one.
If you're brewing something fruit-forward, stick with paper.
But again (and we’ll keep reiterating this), you can’t really go wrong. AeoPress’ are known for clean cups, so whatever you happen to have is great.
Part two: How to make a solid, simple AeroPress recipe
My AeroPress method
I use a 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio, a touch stronger than the 1:16 I use for pour-over. Which breaks down to…
15 grams of coffee (ground fairly coarse)
220 grams of filtered water
That fills the chamber nearly to the top and makes a full mug with no dilution needed.
A standard AeroPress recipe
Once you have 15 grams of coffee, ground medium/fine and 220 grams of filtered water at a boil, all you need is the apparatus and a paper or metal filter.
Quick note of comfort here, too: If you have an automatic kettle (or are boiling water over a campstove), don’t stress too much about the temp. I find that getting it to a near boil and then letting it sit for just a minute is great.
How to brew AeroPress, start to finish
Put a paper filter in the cap and rinse it with hot water. This washes out the paper taste and preheats the mug underneath.
Assemble the AeroPress and set it on your mug.
Grind 15 grams of coffee to a medium-fine grind and add it to the chamber (or ask us to grind it for you in the shop!)
Start a timer and pour 220 grams of water at 200°F, filling the chamber close to the top.
Give it one good stir to ensure every ground is wet.
Insert the plunger about a quarter inch, just to to create a seal, which stops it from dripping through while it steeps.
Steep for 90 seconds.
Press slowly and steadily down on the plunger over your mug now, itll take about 30 seconds
Stop pressing when you hear the hiss. Going past that pulls the last of the bitter stuff through
Total time, grinding included: about three minutes.
The ideal grind size for your AeroPress
Medium-fine. So, finer than a French press but a little finer than a pour-over (nowhere near espresso).
For reference, I use a size 12 grind on my Baratza Encore for pour-over and around 9 for flash brew. For AeroPress I land around 10 or 11.
Finer means more extraction: more body, more sweetness, and eventually bitterness if you keep going. Maybe a little grit. Coarser gives you a lighter, cleaner, more tea-like cup. This is the dial most worth playing with once you've made a few.
Water temperature
I use 200°F, always filtered (to a boil and settled for a minute).
The instructions in the AeroPress box call for something much cooler, around 175°F, and plenty of good coffee people brew that way. I don't. Cooler water gives me a flat cup, with the acidity sanded off, and acidity is a lot of what I'm paying for in the coffees I buy.
For reference, I brew pour-over at 202–203°F, because by the time water leaves my kettle and hits the coffee, it's landing around 199–200°F. The AeroPress sits right about there. The Specialty Coffee Association treats roughly 93°C / 199°F as a practical target for hot brewing, and that's the neighborhood I want to be in.
How long should the AeroPress brew process take
90 seconds is my default.
60 seconds: brighter, more delicate, more tea-like
90 seconds: my baseline
2 minutes: heavier, sweeter, rounder
Longer than about two and a half minutes, and you start pulling in the flavors that make coffee taste dull and papery. Unlike cold brew, where hours of extra steeping keep developing body, immersion at 200°F moves fast. There's no reason to sit around.
Press speed once its ready
Slow and steady works well. If you’ve used an AeroPress before (or haven’t, which you will feel when you try it), you want a consistent push down without forcing any grounds through the filter.
A good way to guague if your coffee is ground too fine is also based on how much of a struggle it is to plunge; if you’re really having to put all your bodyweight to drain it, it’s probably too fine.
It sould be steady pressure, not necessarily a workout.
Part three: Where an AeroPress really shines
Most brewers are good in one place: your kitchen counter, with your kettle, your scale, and your grinder. The AeroPress is the one that travels, and many folks love it for its ability to give them great coffee anywhere they go.
Camping
This is where it's unbeatable, and it's most of why I own one.
The whole brewer is plastic and fits in its own zip-up carrying case, so you never have to worry about shattering glass or bending it. It weighs as much as an empty water bottle.
French presses are great choice for camping as well, but some are made of glass and are a bit more bulky.
Other reasons the AeroPress works for camping:
No separate vessel. It brews directly into your camp mug, so you have one less thing to carry and one less thing to wash.
Your camp stove is enough. Boil water in whatever pot you already brought, pull it off the flame, and count to 30. That lands you close to 200°F without a thermometer. If the water's still bubbling when it hits the coffee, wait a little longer.
Cleanup is one motion. Twist the cap off, push the plunger, and a dry puck of grounds pops straight into the fire ring or your trash bag. Just wipe the seal, and you're done. No rinsing a filter cone, no dumping a slurry of wet grounds.
Filters weigh nothing. A hundred of them stack to about half an inch tall.
It's forgiving when you can't measure. No scale on the trail is fine; a heaping tablespoon and a half of coffee gets you close. The AeroPress kit comes with a perfect scoop size.
Grind before you leave and seal it in a jar, or bring a hand grinder if you're the kind of person who brings a hand grinder. If you're grinding ahead, go a click coarser than usual, since pre-ground coffee sitting in a bag for a few days will extract a little faster.
Travel and hotels
Same argument, different setting. It fits in a carry-on and it will not break. Hotel rooms almost always have a way to heat water and almost never have a way to make coffee worth drinking. Bring the AeroPress, a bag of beans ground before you left, and skip the lobby carafe.
The office
If your office coffee situation is a pot that's been sitting on a burner since 8am, this is your escape. A hot water tap or an electric kettle is all you need, and the whole thing rinses in a bathroom sink.
Part four: Which coffees taste best in an AeroPress
A short, hot immersion brew holds on to the volatile stuff (the fruit, florals, and aromatics that make a coffee taste like something other than just "coffee.") That points you at our lighter, more delicate options.
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If you're new to this and don't know where to start: Detroit House Blend is our do-it-all roast.
Part five: Adjusting your process
What should it taste like?
A good AeroPress cup should taste sweet, clean, full, and clear, with more body than a pour-over and more brightness than a French press. It sits right between them, which is a nice place to be.
If it tastes thin or sour: your grind is too coarse, your water is too cool, or your steep was too short. Go one click finer or add 30 seconds.
If it tastes harsh or bitter: your grind is too fine, you pressed too hard, or you pressed past the hiss. Back the grind off and slow the press down.
If it tastes fine but boring: try two minutes instead of 90 seconds and see if the sweetness fills in.
We always recommend changing one thing at a time to narrow each step down, starting with grind size, then perhaps moving to dosage or time.
Can you make it stronger?
Yes. Two ways.
Change the ratio. Try 17 grams of coffee to the same 220 grams of water, which puts you close to 1:13. Heavier, more concentrated, still balanced.
Brew a concentrate and dilute it. Use 20 grams of coffee and 150 grams of water, press, then add hot water to the mug until it tastes right. This is a bypass, and it's the move when you're making coffee for someone who likes it weaker than you do.
Can you make AeroPress over ice?
Everything in our flash brew guide applies here. Brew straight onto ice, and you get a fast iced coffee that keeps the aromatics intact.
Try:
17 grams coffee
130 grams hot water
130 grams ice in the mug below
Same 90-second steep, same slow press. The coffee lands on the ice and chills immediately. It's the quickest iced coffee in this building, and it works on a campsite too if you've got a cooler.
What about the “inverted method”?
Instead, you can flip the AeroPress upside down, brew in the chamber, then turn the whole thing over onto your mug and press. The point is that nothing drips through during the steep, so your brew time is exactly what you intended.
Standard orientation loses a small amount of water through the filter while you steep, and seating the plunger a quarter inch (step 6 above) handles nearly all of it. If you fall in love with this brewer and want to chase the last few percent, try inverted then. It is not the difference between good coffee and bad coffee, it’s just different.
If you don’t own an AeroPress
The Clever Dripper is the closest cousin and the easiest brewer in the shop. Coffee, water, wait, set it on your mug, and it drains. Same immersion sweetness, same paper-filter clarity, no pressing at all. It uses the Filtropa 04 filters we stock. It's less packable than an AeroPress, so it's a counter brewer, not a trail brewer.
The NextLevel Pulsar goes the other direction… immersion and pour-over, no bypass, with a flow valve you can actually dial in. More brewer than most people need on a Tuesday morning, and a genuinely great one if you like having something to fuss with.
Final thoughts
The AeroPress isn't the most precise brewer, the most beautiful, or the one that will impress anyone standing in your kitchen. It's the one that gives you a good cup when you're half awake, or in a hotel room, or sitting on a log at 6am watching water come to a boil.
15 grams, 220 grams of water at 200°F, 90 seconds, slow press.
Remember, coffee flavor is subjective (like most foods). Whatever method makes the coffee taste best to you should be your preferred method. But if there's an AeroPress in your cabinet, or room in your pack for one, go pull it out.