Baratza Vario All Purpose Coffee Grinder

Baratza Vario Overview

The Baratza Vario is a coffee lover’s dream. Its electronic controls allow you to program three separate doses for automatic on-demand grinding by time. A big step up from the Virtuoso, the Vario keeps the compact body style and satin finish nickel-plated accents, while making clutch upgrades in power, versatility and operation.

Features and Performance

The Vario nixes hopper-twisting adjustment, opting instead for dual-cam grind adjustment. With it, you can adjust the grind across ten macro settings and twenty-three micro settings, for a total of 230 steps. This vast adjustment allows you to really fine tune your grind for any brew method, but is especially important when dialing in a fine espresso grind for a prosumer machine.

Another major upgrade from the Virtuoso, and our favorite addition, has to be the Vario’s programmability; users can automatically dispense grinds for three times of their choosing. The Vario is one of our go to recommendations for anyone who often grinds for multiple brew methods, since it allows you to mimic stepless adjustment for espresso then immediately swap to a coarse grind for pour over.

A metal portaholder and grounds container come standard with the Vario to accommodate any grinding scenario. The Vario’s upgraded 54mm ceramic flat burrs round out the grinder’s great performance; ceramic burrs don’t retain the amount of heat stainless burrs can, thus protecting the coffee’s natural flavors, and, as an added bonus, they’re harder than steel and stay sharper longer.

The Baratza Vario is easy to use and program. The grind can be fine tuned within a range of 250 to 1150 microns by adjusting the macro and micro sliders on the Vario’s face. Micro adjustments are made in between macro settings for the most possible refinement of the grind.

We recommend jotting down the settings for your favorite brew methods so you can easily and reliably swap between them. You can grind manually or program the presets to dispense coffee for a desired amount of time on-demand, and they’ll dutifully dose with an accuracy of 1/10th of a second.

For weight-based grinding on demand, take a look at the Vario-W; or for more grind settings, touch screen controls, and timed or weight based grinding functionality, the Forte AP is an excellent step up.

Why You Should Get It

The Vario’s high speed motor whips the burrs around at 1350 RPM, making short work of beans and dispensing them directly into an awaiting portafilter or enclosed 5 oz. grounds container, averaging a quick 2 grams per second. The 230 grind settings are easy to switch between, making it a great tool for anyone who drinks different types of coffee drinks, as well. All-in-all, the Baratza Vario impresses with it's flexibility and high performance.