Breville's new $600 coffee machine makes pour-overs from scratch

The Spiral Luxe Auto Pour Over combines a coffee grinder with a rotating water spout.

Breville

What Breville did for toast and soda the company is now hoping to do for pour-over coffee. The new Breville Spiral Luxe Auto Pour Over is a decidedly premium $600 kitchen appliance that makes pour-overs from scratch. Machines that turn the somewhat fussy process of making pour-overs into something as simple as a Mr. Coffee have existed for years, but Breville's device goes a step further by adding a built-in coffee grinder.

Typical pour-overs require you to grind coffee to the right consistency, dump it into a filter and manually pour water at timed intervals to brew it. The Spiral Luxe Auto Pour Over is designed to completely automate the process. The machine has a grinder with "bespoke 40mm flat burrs" for grinding beans, a conical dripper that holds them once you start brewing and an articulating water spout that moves in a spiral pattern just like a human barista would. Breville says the machine's heating system can get water to the right temperature in seconds, and it's able to maintain its heat throughout the pour so you hit a consistent brewing temperature.

Breville

The Spiral Luxe's built-in display and controls let you dial in the amount and strength of your pour-over coffee before you brew, but the interface can also be used to save custom recipes. The machine's Advanced Edit mode lets you adjust things like the grinder, brew ratio, water temperature and even the length of time between pours. The machine also has a Delayed Auto Start feature that lets you program your coffee to be ready at a specific time, like when you wake up.

For coffee aficionados, the Breville Spiral Luxe Auto Pour Over seems like a potentially promising way to turn pour-overs from a time-consuming treat you enjoy on the weekend to something you drink daily — provided you have $600 lying around and enough counter space. For everyone else, cheaper machines that could work just as well exist, even if they don't have a spiral pour or a built-in grinder. 

The Breville Spiral Luxe Auto Pour Over is available to buy now for $600 from Breville and Williams-Sonoma.