Brewing time, extraction time, shot time — three terms for the same principle. Yet, there is still confusion about when to actually start counting. At the push of a button? At the first drop? Let's clear this up. (Are you looking for a complete guide to preparing espresso? You can find it in our Espresso Preparation Guide.)
Brewing time is contact time
Whether you call it brewing time, extraction time, or shot time: it always refers to the contact time between water and coffee. Nothing more, nothing less.
Extraction begins the moment hot water hits your coffee puck. Not when the first drop falls into the cup. And it ends when the pump stops working and no more water is pushed through the coffee.
This sounds simple, but in practice, it leads to regular misunderstandings. Depending on the machine, between one and four seconds can pass between the moment you start the shot and the moment water actually reaches the coffee.
When should you start counting?
The short answer: When your machine starts delivering water.
On most machines, this happens practically as soon as you press the button or pull the lever. In that case, the button press is your start signal. Some machines have a slight delay of one or two seconds — you can easily test this by running the machine without the portafilter and watching when the water comes out. You can then simply subtract that latency.
Why not count from the first drop? Because several seconds of extraction take place between water contact and the first drop in the cup. The water must first penetrate the entire coffee puck before anything comes out at the bottom. If you only count from the first drop, you are omitting several seconds of contact time — and your recipe will no longer be accurate.
And those first seconds of contact between water and coffee have a massive influence on the total extraction time. This is where you can see whether the grind size has been chosen correctly or not.
What a scale's drip detection can (and cannot) do
Some scales start the timer automatically as soon as the first drop hits the scale. This is not suitable for measuring brewing time because it does not represent the start of extraction.
Nevertheless, the function is not worthless. It can tell you something about your coffee: If the first drop appears after only three seconds, you have probably ground too coarsely. If nothing appears for ten seconds, the grind size is likely too fine — or your puck has an issue. As a diagnostic tool, drip detection is useful. As a stopwatch for brewing time, it is not.
We have added our favorite scales to our shop. There is something for every price range.
Vibration pump vs. rotary pump: The difference that changes your recipes
This is where it becomes practically relevant, because your pump determines how you need to interpret recipes.
A rotary pump builds pressure almost immediately. Within a few seconds, full brewing pressure is applied to the coffee. The brew chamber fills, the water hits the puck, and you're off. With a rotary pump, the button press and the start of extraction are practically the same thing.
A vibration pump works differently. It takes significantly longer to build pressure — the flow starts slowly and increases over several seconds. This means: the contact time is running, but the first phase is nowhere near as intense as with a rotary pump. The coffee is effectively pre-wetted gently before full pressure arrives.
This has consequences for your recipes.
The +3-second rule
Most recipes you get from roasters — "18g in, 36g out, 25 seconds" — are made with rotary pumps. This is because many roasters use professional commercial machines, and they almost always have rotary pumps.
If you have a vibration pump at home (which is the case for the vast majority of home machines), you need about three seconds more for such recipes. So: 25-second recipe instruction → around 28 seconds on your machine. This is not an exact law, but a good rule of thumb to get into the right range.
At Kaffeemacher, we usually provide our recipes for both vibration and rotary pumps and label them accordingly. If you are unsure about a roaster, ask which machine the recipe was created with. That gives you a better reference point than any rule of thumb.
Extraction time for single and double espresso
A question that often arises: Does a double espresso need to run longer than a single?
Not necessarily. If you use twice the amount of coffee in a larger basket for a double espresso and let twice the amount of water flow through, the contact time often remains similar. The resistance of the coffee puck and the flow rate scale together. What changes is the brew ratio — and that should remain constant. A 1:2 ratio (18g coffee → 36g espresso) applies to the double just as a 1:2 ratio (9g → 18g) applies to the single. However, single espressos always have a dynamic of their own. A small amount of coffee powder does not form resistance as evenly as the coffee powder in a double espresso. A reason why we tend to advise making double extractions.
The extraction time is your control tool: If the time is off despite the same brew ratio, the grind size is likely incorrect.
Brewing time as a guide, not a law
25 seconds is not a magic number. We provide recipes as time ranges, not as a second-accurate requirement. The reason: every machine behaves slightly differently, every coffee reacts slightly differently, and two seconds more or less make little difference in terms of taste for a well-dialed-in recipe.
Use the brewing time as a guideline. If you end up at 22 seconds with 18g of coffee and 36g of espresso, you are likely a bit too coarse. At 35 seconds, too fine. But whether 26 or 28 seconds — try it and decide based on taste.
In the end, what's in the cup is what matters. Brewing time helps you get there. But it doesn't replace your palate.
Do you want to know how pre-wetting and pre-infusion affect the extraction time? We explain this in the article Pre-wetting for espresso: What does it really do? — including the question of why 3 seconds of pre-infusion is almost always too short.
This article is also available as a video on our YouTube channel.
