The ready light means the boiler is at temperature. It does not mean the machine is.
Why longer
The group head is a heavy lump of brass with no heating element of its own on most machines. It is heated by contact and by water passing through, and it takes far longer than the boiler.
The portafilter is another 400 to 600 g of metal, usually at room temperature.
Brewing into a cold group and a cold portafilter drops the actual brew temperature by several degrees.
The times
Single boiler — 20 to 30 minutes. E61 group — 30 to 45 minutes. The group is enormous and famously slow. Thermoblock — 3 to 5 minutes, since there is little mass to heat. This is their main advantage. Bean-to-cup — a minute or two, same reason.
Speeding it up
Leave the portafilter in the group while it heats.
Pull a blank shot — run water through the empty group into a cup — a couple of minutes before brewing. This flushes hot water through the cold metal.
Run a shot of hot water into your cup to preheat both at once.
The first shot
Almost always different, even after a proper warm-up. Many people pull one and discard it.
Timers
Some machines have a scheduled start. On others, a cheap plug timer set for 30 minutes before you get up works, if the machine has a physical power switch.
Last reviewed 8 August 2026