Yes, and it is probably the highest-return twenty-euro purchase in home espresso.
Why volume does not work
A double espresso is often described as “about 60 ml”, and volume is exactly the wrong measure. Crema is foam, its volume varies enormously between beans and roast dates, and a shot with a thick crema head looks full while containing considerably less liquid than one with thin crema.
Weight ignores foam. Thirty-six grams is thirty-six grams whatever it looks like.
What to weigh
The dose. Coffee going into the basket, weighed to 0.1 g. Grinders that dose by time drift as beans dry out over a fortnight, so the same three seconds delivers a different weight in week three than in week one.
The yield. Espresso arriving in the cup, on a scale under the drip tray. This is what tells you whether you hit your ratio.
Together those two numbers make a shot repeatable, and repeatability is the entire basis of getting better — you cannot learn from a change if three things changed.
What kind of scale
For espresso: 0.1 g resolution, a fast refresh so the display keeps up, and a footprint that fits on your drip tray. A slow scale makes you overshoot every time. A scale that does not fit under the portafilter is a scale you stop using.
For filter, 1 g is plenty.
When you can stop
You do not stop. Professionals weigh every shot. But once your setup is dialled in and stable, weighing the yield becomes a glance rather than a ritual — and you will notice immediately on the day something has changed.
Questions people actually ask
Can I use a kitchen scale?
For the dose, yes. For the yield, usually not — kitchen scales refresh slowly and are too large for a drip tray, and both of those turn weighing into an annoyance you will abandon.
What about grinders that dose by weight?
They remove the dosing half of the problem and cost considerably more. You still want a scale under the cup for the yield.
Last reviewed 8 August 2026