Jura ENA 8 review: a transformative coffee maker

If you're looking at luxury coffee makers, you'll know that Jura is at the top end of the market. Their machines can easily cost you over $2,000. Even though they're beautiful and smart, that's a big enough price tag to make you think twice. Are they worth the investment?

Over the last year, I've tested seventy of the best coffee makers. Amongst them, the Jura ENA 8 stands out as an impressive model. Not only is it slick, smart, and easy to use, it makes a delicious coffee too.

I put every function of the Jura ENA 8 to test in my home and then our experts retested it two years later. We've pitted it against models from De'Longhi and Breville, so you know exactly where to spend your money to get the best coffee maker on the market. Here's everything you need to know.

Jura ENA 8 review: specs

Specifications

Unboxing

The Jura ENA 8 comes in a hefty box, but I was pleased to see that it's packaged as sustainably as I could hope for a premium coffee maker. There is an extensive control manual and plenty of extras such as a water filter and a coffee scoop for those who will want to add ground coffee to their machine.

The Jura ENA 8 does not come with a milk container, which is a shame given the machine's price. It is fully equipped to make milky drinks though, with an accessory set that includes a tube that you can insert into the side of the dispenser on the front of the coffee maker to froth your milk. In theory, you could pop this tube into a glass of milk, but I would recommend using a milk container to complete the look of the coffee maker.

Jura did send me the glass milk container and the steel milk tube casing to get the full experience, which is great because I do really enjoy milky coffee. Setting this up was easy enough, and after the machine was flushed out I was ready to enjoy my coffee.

What is it like to use?

The machine is easy to set up. Once connected to the power, the control panel walked me through the setup process. It comes with a strip of paper that you need to dip into your home tap water to gauge the water hardness in your area.

You then enter this into the machine, which helps it to deduce the level of cleaning you'll need to keep the coffee maker in top condition. This is not a feature I have seen in other coffee makers, and it's nice to see that Jura designs its machines to last long into the future.

Test 1: espresso

To make your coffee you need to press the power button, which sits at the far back of the coffee maker next to the coffee bean container. This does mean you need to reach, and I think it would have been better to place the power button in a more accessible place.

After switching on, the Jura ENA 8 heats itself and flushes its system fully, meaning you'll only get fresh coffee in your drink. It is definitely worth placing a cup underneath the dispenser for when the coffee maker flushes itself out, or you'll end up having to remove the underside of the machine (including the grounds container) on quite a regular basis to empty it.

There is a full-color control panel that you can use to scroll through your coffee options. You press the bottom right or left buttons to scroll along the options, and select your coffee using the top buttons. When choosing a shot of espresso you can choose to increase or decrease the strength and length of the shot, but it defaults to 40ml (or 1.4oz) unless you change this in the settings panel.

One of the design features that really makes the Jura ENA 8 really stand out is its light-up dispenser. When brewing espresso or black coffee, the machine illuminates the drink below it in an orange hue which emphases the crema. It's a luxurious experience, and this attention to design is reflected across the removable, circular water dispenser which slots seamlessly into the side of the machine, and the slightly forward-leaning curve of the front panel, which prevents it from looking too blocky.

I tried this machine with a number of different beans and a mixture of specialty and store-bought varieties. I can confidently say that the Jura ENA 8 brings out the individual flavor of any coffee you put in it. My coffee never came out bitter or sour, and I could really enjoy the complexity of some of the more interesting coffee I get from various subscriptions.

While I do enjoy the occasional barista-style machine that allows you to grind and brew your own beans, there is no denying that removing the variables from the brewing process will allow your coffee to come out right every time. Especially if you opt for artisan, specialist coffee beans, it's worth choosing a machine like the Jura ENA 8 which will bring out the best of your brew in every shot.

Test 2: milky coffees

The Jura ENA 8 does come with a tube that can be used to feed milk into the brewing unit on the front of the machine, but you'd need to place this into a rogue container of milk in order to use it, which is frankly not in keeping with the sophistication of the machine.

Jura sent me a milk dispenser to try with the ENA 8 which I was very grateful for. Its essentially a glass cup with a lid on top that houses a straw. You connect this metal straw to the tube through the top of the lid, and plug it into the side of the dispenser to make your milky drinks. You can then remove the milk dispenser and place it in the refrigerator when it's done.

For milky drinks, the light under the dispenser shines a cool white light on your milk as it brews. You can choose from Cappuccino, Macchiato, Latte macchiato, and Flat white when choosing your drinks, and all of these are dispensed differently. For a macchiato, you'll get your foamed milk dispensed first and it will then be topped off with an espresso which sits directly under the milk foam, creating a distinctive latte macchiato finish.

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The Jura ENA 8 making a latte macchiato

My favorite drink to have in the Jura ENA 8 was a cappuccino, which has the perfect proportion of coffee to firm frothy milk. This comes out with a fine micro-foam that's consistent and long-lasting.

With the milk drinks though, I would've preferred it if the Jura had come up with a way to flush out the milk tube after each drink. This is a feature I've seen in the De'Longhi Dinamica Plus, where the milk system flushes itself out after each use. With the Jura I had to rinse the tube under water to remove lingering milk from the tube and prevent it from going sour.

Long-term usage

The Jura ENA 8 got a lot of use when I tested it for a couple of months in my kitchen. In a household where we get through six coffees a day easily, it's fair to say that we had to refill the 1.1-litre water tank on a regular basis. This was not so bad because it lifted easily away from the side of the machine, but the trickier task was topping up the bean hopper at the back of the machine.

Most of the coffee I buy comes in 250g bags, and the bean container in the Jura ENA 8 takes half of this - 125g. We refilled it every couple of days, which required reaching under a kitchen counter and aiming carefully to avoid spilling any beans. There is also a ground coffee chute closer to the front of the machine, with a paddle that opens it next to the chute. This is quite small and when I did make decaf coffee with it I found that it was hard not to spill any grounds around the outside of this area, which required wiping it up. It's not an issue if you don't plan on using ground coffee very often - and to be honest, why would you when the Jura ENA 8 grinds so well - but something to keep in mind for houses with caffeinated and decaf drinkers.

The Jura ENA 8 reminds you to refill the water tank, empty the grounds container and top up on beans where necessary. I did find that where I made a double espresso, the machine would stop after the first shot if it ran out of water or beans, and I'd have to re-program for a second shot as opposed to it automatically resuming when beans are added.

Another element is that the ground container is quite small. It needed emptying as often as once per day (like I said, we drink a lot of coffee so this may not apply to everyone) and when you do empty it you need to pull away the entire front drip tray to reach it. The entirety of the drip tray is attached which means you need to pull away quite a large slab of plastic to empty and clean it.

Cleaning

Every 300 uses, the Jura ENA 8 will remind you to clean it. There are a few different symbols that indicate that the water filter needs switching out, that the milk frothing system requires a deep-clean, and that the entire brewing unit needs cleaning.

Cleaning out the milk brewing unit is really easy to do, as the machine walks you through the entire process. You use shot of descaling pellets and place it inside a dedicated cleaning container into which you insert the milk tube. It pulls the water, with the dissolved pellets, through the machine and ejects the dirty water out of the coffee dispenser. You then rinse this out with clean water.

To clean the machine itself, you take a tablet and place it in the ground coffee chute. You then top up the water container and let the machine flush itself out, before emptying the drip tray and rinsing with clean water.

Descaling is easy enough too. You dissolve a descaling tablet before adding to the water container, and run a descaling program through the settings panel on the machine interface.

How does it rate online?

Even though the Jura ENA 8 is an expensive coffee maker, it has really good reviews. People find it easy to use, they love the smart features, and everyone says that it makes incredible coffee.

In terms of milk frothing, Jura's results were praised by everyone. Without fail, people said that it made smooth, silky milk, even on non-dairy alternatives. However, some people found the system a little less intuitive than most other automatic machines.

In fact, there were a few people who thought that the buttons needed some adjustment. The screen looks like it should be touchscreen, but you have to use the side buttons to navigate through the different settings. You get used to them quickly, but it's worth noting.

How does it compare?

The Jura ENA 8 is an expensive bean-to-cup espresso machine, and there's no denying that it won't be an option for every household. Alternatives like the Philips 5400 Series Fully Automatic Espresso Machine work in a similar way but at a lower cost.

That said, the Jura definitely made the best failsafe espresso I've tried from an automatic machine. There is next-to-no margin for human error, which will be perfect for coffee-lovers who don't fancy themselves a budding barista, or who don't like the mess that comes with home grinding and brewing in separate units.

Another comparable model is the De'Longhi Eletta Explore, which is one of the most expensive automatic espresso machines you can buy. In terms of versatility, the De'Longhi is much better. It can make 52 different coffees, including cold brew, and it's easy to adjust. The two machines are similar aesthetically and in how easy they are to use, but I find the milk system on the De'Longhi much more intuitive.

Should you buy it?

The Jura ENA 8 won't be in the budget for every coffee-lover, but it's a machine that is built to last for years to come, and definitely the kind of investment you'll thank yourself for making if you enjoy fresh espresso and milky drinks every morning.

In testing I found that the grounds water container and the bean hopper were a little on the small side for the scale of coffee-drinking I'm used to, but thoughtful touches such as a removable water tank made this easy enough to power through on a daily basis.

What impressed me most was the sleek design, and the quality of the espresso I was able to make in this machine. Never sour, never bitter, always quietly ground and luxuriously poured into my mug. It's a ritual you'll get used to very quickly, and it's definitely raised the bar for me when it comes to drinking coffee on a daily basis.

How we test

Before we recommend a coffee maker, we take it to our test kitchen. Here, we use it to its full capabilities, so that we get a sense of who it would suit and how well it performs.

If an espresso machine has an integrated grinder, we test that first. Then, the marker of any good machine, we make an espresso. Once we have made those two, we make an Americano by adding hot water to an espresso and a cappuccino by adding frothy milk to an espresso. This means that we get to test the steam wand and hot water dispenser, if the machine has them.

We also unbox, clean, and store every machine. That way, we get a holistic experience with the machine. We base our feedback on a range of criteria: the coffee needs to taste good, the machine should be ergonomic and easy to use, and we love innovation.

Our team of experts are all well versed in appliances and testing. In particular, our barista, Laura, tested this coffee maker. She has used a range of espresso machines, from commercial and pricy, to compact and affordable, so is ready to deliver a good analysis of every appliance. You can find out more on our dedicated how we test coffee machines page.