A Deeper Look at the Top 30 Coffees of 2024

In 2024, Coffee Review blind-tasted over 3,000 coffee samples from hundreds of leading roasting companies and coffee producers around the world.  Over the course of the year, we published more than 600 reviews on CoffeeReview.com. The Top 30 Coffees of 2024 list is our editors’ ranking of the 30 most exciting of these coffees, representing roughly 1 percent of the samples we cupped and 5 percent of the coffees we reviewed.

This is the 12^th year we have compiled our Top 30 list. This annual event supports our mission to help consumers find and enjoy superior-quality coffees, while also helping recognize and reward the farmers and roasters who produce these coffees. The Top 30 celebrates and promotes coffee roasters, farmers, mill operators, importers and other coffee-industry professionals who make an extra effort to produce coffees that are both superb in quality and distinctive in character.

If one were to take a cursory look at the Coffee Review website, one might assume that nearly all coffees earn a score of 90 points or higher.  However, the reality is that readers are only seeing the tip of the iceberg in terms of quality.  Keep in mind, Coffee Review typically publishes reviews only of higher-scoring coffees (usually 90 points or higher) that are likely to be of interest to our readers and to consumers.

In fact, in 2024, fewer than one out of four of the more than 3,000 coffees we tested scored 90 points or higher. Roughly 275 coffees, or around 8 percent of the total cupped, earned a score of 94 points or higher.  Those coffees that did achieve these very high scores reflect the ever-intensifying innovation and dedication of the world’s leading coffee producers and roasters.

However, while scores matter, we always offer the caveat that scores alone have limitations. Coffee lovers may well take more pleasure in a lower-rated coffee that matches their taste preferences than a higher-scoring coffee that isn’t their style. We do our best to characterize a coffee’s character in the “Blind Assessment” paragraph of our reviews, and even more succinctly in the “Bottom Line” that concludes each review. We encourage readers to look beyond our overall scores and rankings to identify the coffees that they find the most exciting, enjoyable, and in line with their coffee budgets.

For those curious about how we conduct our testing and rating processes at Coffee Review, see How Coffee Review Works. For what scores mean with respect to the wide range of coffee styles and qualities, see Interpreting Reviews.

Difficult Choices

As we evaluate more and better coffees every year, it becomes increasingly difficult to select just 30 coffees for our annual Top 30 list.  All of the coffees that rated 94 points or higher in 2024 are worthy of celebrating, as are many of the unique and exciting coffees that didn’t score quite as high. Obviously, not all of the coffees earning 94 points or more can appear in the Top 30.  In fact, in 2024, dozens of coffees that earned 95 or even 96 points did not ultimately make our Top 30 list.

As in past years, we selected and ranked our Top 30 coffees based on quality and distinctiveness (represented primarily by overall rating), value (reflected by most affordable price per pound and price relative to similar coffees), and consideration of other extrinsic factors that include uniqueness of origin, processing method, tree variety, certifications such as Fair Trade and organic, and general singularity.

In each of the 12 years that we have published our Top 30 list, including 2024, our top pick has been a single-origin coffee — meaning a coffee from a single country and region (and usually from a single farm or cooperative).

#1 Coffee of 2024

This year, our #1 coffee is the 98-point Kahiko Orange Kona Typica, produced by Karen and Lee Patterson and their team at Hula Daddy Kona Coffee in Holualoa, Hawaii.

“Orange” refers to a processing variation in which the coffee fruit is co-fermented with Kona oranges also grown on the Hula Daddy farm.  Co-fermenting freshly picked coffee with other natural fruits is the latest trend in specialty coffee, but a controversial one. See our brief overview of the controversy here. Interestingly, we did not cite “orange” when we blind-tasted this coffee. In the review from November, we describe it as: “Elegant, immersive, unique. Butterscotch, honeysuckle, cocoa nib, coconut, muscat grape, bergamot in aroma and cup. Layered, intense, sparkling acidity; very smooth, syrupy mouthfeel. Long, incense-like finish with notes of honeysuckle and bergamot and undertones of muscat and cocoa nib.” Perhaps muscat grape and bergamot add up to a complex variation on orange, but, in any event, the impact of the fruit is fully contexted in the sensory matrix of the coffee. We know we are drinking coffee (a very fine one), not some half-fruit, half-coffee concoction.

This is the second time Hula Daddy Kona Coffee has earned the #1 spot on our list. The first was in 2018 for its 96-point Kona Mocca®. And it is the first time that any farmer or roaster (Hula Daddy is both) has earned the #1 spot more than once.

In other years, coffees from Panama have earned the top spot five times, in 2014, 2015, 2019, 2020 and 2021. In 2017 and 2022, the top coffee was from Yemen. Coffees from Colombia (2023), Kenya (2016) and Ethiopia (2013) also have been celebrated as Coffee Review’s #1 coffee of the year.

Top 30 Statistics

Ratings and Price

The average overall rating for coffees on our Top 30 list for 2024 is 95.5 out of a possible 100, in line with averages for our Top 30 coffees in past years.

In 2024, the average price of the coffees on our Top 30 list was $97.08, a substantial drop from $124.56 per pound in 2023.  (Coffees sold in non-U.S. currencies were converted to U.S. dollars for averaging purposes.)

However, the average price can be misleading, as it is often skewed upward by a few very expensive coffees.  For example, this year, two coffees offered by Taiwan roasters were priced at $320 and $850 per pound.  If you remove these two coffees from the calculation, the average price drops to $62.21 per pound.

As in past years, higher-scoring coffees in our 2024 Top 30 tended to cost more than lower-scoring coffees:

• 97- and 98-point coffees (5) –$309.50/pound
• 96-point coffees (12) – $67.85/pound
• 95-point coffees (7) – $54.47/pound
• 94-point coffees (3) – $33.22/pound
• 93-point coffees (3) –$23.30/pound

Value

One of the selection criteria for the Top 30 is value, measured by price per pound relative to coffees of similar quality and style. Many of the coffees on our list are priced in line with similar, though usually less distinguished, specialty coffees in the marketplace.

Six coffees were priced at less than $30 per pound, or the equivalent of $22 per 12-ounce bag:

• #7 Utopian Coffee, Ethiopia Ayla Bombe, 96 points – $20.00/12 oz.
• #13 Speedwell Coffee, Colombia El Vergel #1, 95 points – $15.00/12 oz.
• #14 Coffea Guatemala, Chich’upao Guatemala, 93 points – $12.00/17.64 oz.
• #22 Side By Each Brewing, Burundi Kayanza Cima, 93 points – $19.00/16 oz.
• #24 Durango Coffee, Costa Rica Las Lajas Perla Negra, 95 points – $18.95/12 oz.
• #27 Old Soul Co, El Salvador Finca Loma La Gloria, 94 points, $20.00/12 oz.

If you are interested in shopping for Top 30 coffees that are still available for sale, visit our Shop for the Top 30 page, which provides links to the roasters’ websites where the coffees may be available. At the time this article was published, nine of the Top 30 coffees were still available for purchase, including the four value coffees highlighted above with links.

One of the available coffees is the #1 Hula Daddy Orange Kahiko.  As is the case with most rare and unique coffees, the Orange Kahiko is quite expensive at $99.95/8 ounces.  However, it is a fraction of the cost of many other high-scoring nano-lot and auction coffees.  And, because it was reviewed late in the year (November), close to the time of this report, the coffee is still available on Hula Daddy’s website.

Origin

With six appearances, Colombia is the most frequently cited origin in our 2024 Top 30. The probable reason is the surge in innovative processing methods among some Colombian coffee producers, particularly those in the southwestern departments of Cauca and Huila.

Hawaii is second in number of placements this year with four coffees. Ethiopia has three, while Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Kenya and Panama each appear twice. Filling out the list are seven origins represented by one coffee each. Three of the 30 samples are intended for brewing as espresso. Only one blend appears on the list, combining two Colombia coffees.

Tree Variety

When describing last year’s Top 30 list, we wrote: “There are stars and superstars among the hundreds of varieties of Arabica grown in the world today, and coffees from these distinguished varieties continue to dominate the very highest ratings at Coffee Review.”  Still true,  although this year, the lineup of those varieties has changed, essentially expanding, as coffee growers experiment with a wider range of tree varieties than ever before, seeking the exclusive and distinctive.

Twenty-seven of the coffees on the list were identified by variety.  Six were produced from trees of the celebrated Geisha (also spelled Gesha) variety, the Ethiopia-derived variety that burst onto the world coffee stage during a green coffee competition in Panama in 2004, breaking all rating and price records, and which since has been planted all over the world. Another five of the Top 30 came from trees of the old and traditional Red Bourbon or Yellow Bourbon varieties, both long admired for their subtle distinctiveness. But among the remaining coffees, a wide range of varieties vie for elite status, including Sudan Rume (a recently popularized variety from Ethiopia); the giant-beaned Maragogipe; the tiny-beaned Mocca; and Java, a variety traditionally grown in Indonesia that has been traced back to Ethiopia.

But perhaps the biggest surprise on the tree-variety front is the appearance in the Top 30 of a handful of coffees from mainstream tree varieties, varieties hardly known for their distinctive cup. The sensory success of the familiar Typica variety making up the #1 Hula Daddy Orange Kahiko can be in part explained by the impact of its unorthodox but meticulous co-ferment processing, but we also see coffees from ordinary tree varieties processed by the classic washed method rise into the Top 30, including the #13 Speedwell Colombia (from the mainstream Caturra variety) and the #19 El Gran Café espresso (from Villa Sarchi, an exotic-sounding variety but, like Caturra, mainstream). Do these exceptions presage a reaction back toward the pure and classic? Apparently, not yet, given how they are currently outnumbered by anaerobic processed coffees and Geishas.

Processing Method

In 2024, as in 2023, the processing method was disclosed for every coffee on the list, perhaps indicative of the increasing awareness in the coffee world of the importance of processing method in determining cup character.

Ten of the 30 were processed by the natural or dry method, meaning the beans were dried in the whole fruit, a practice that typically encourages sweetness and fruit character.

Nine of this year’s Top 30 coffees — an increase from just two in 2022 — were processed using variations of the anaerobic method, in which a fermentation step takes place in sealed, reduced-oxygen containers. This demanding procedure, done right, generally encourages a lactic sweet-sour structure and often surprising and original aroma and flavor notes.

Seven are traditional washed coffees, meaning fruit skin and flesh were removed before the coffee was dried, usually promoting a clean, sweet-tart cup with a generally familiar “coffee” character.

Finally, one, the Bonlife Lulo Wonka Wonka & Sebastian Gomez, is a blend of two Colombia coffees, each processed by a different method.

Roasters in the Top 30

This year, four roasting companies placed two coffees each on the Top-30 list:

• Hula Daddy Kona Coffee (Holualoa, Hawaii) – #1 and #10
• JBC Coffee Roasters (Madison, Wisconsin) – #3 and #8
• Kakalove Café (Chia-Yi, Taiwan) – #2 and #21
• Utopian Coffee (Fort Wayne, Indiana) – #7 and #16

This concentration of coffees from certain roasters is definitely not intentional. In fact, we make a deliberate effort to minimize repetition and maximize variety among roasters that appear in the Top 30.

To that end, this year, as in the recent past, we consciously limited appearances in the Top 30 to a maximum of two coffees per roaster, regardless of how many highly rated coffees that roaster produced. While that may seem like an arbitrary limit — and it is — it’s important to remember that our list represents our rendering of the most “exciting” coffees of the year, not necessarily the highest-rated. We felt that it wouldn’t be very exciting (to us or others) if the Top 30 list was dominated by a handful of roasting companies that produced a particularly large number of highly rated coffees over the course of the year. Instead, we felt readers would be more excited to read about amazing coffees from a broader variety of roasters.

That said, Coffee Review has been, from its inception, committed to starting with what we actually experience in the cup, not with product categories, marketing considerations, or fashion. It is true that we take into account extrinsic factors like value, rarity and sustainable intentions when we narrow the number of candidates from hundreds to just 30. But ultimately, sensory quality and distinction in the cup, as determined by blind-tasting and reflected in rating, are the entry points for consideration and among the primary factors that influence where coffees land on the list.

Roasting Company Location

Of the 30 coffees on the list, 22 were roasted by companies in the United States. Six were roasted in Taiwan, the same number as in 2023 but an increase from four in 2022, confirming the high quality of roasting and sourcing in the lively, creative coffee space of Taiwan.  Two of this year’s Top 30 coffees were roasted in Guatemala, a first not only for Guatemala but for any coffee-producing origin outside Hawaii, which this year both produced and roasted four coffees on the list.

Please enjoy our list of the Top 30 Coffees of 2024.

Best wishes from Coffee Review for a great new year, full of both the surprises of coffee innovation and the comforts of the classic.