Making great coffee requires the right tools. Brewers may look for scales accurate to a tenth of a gram for measuring beans or completed coffee. Here’s what you should know about the Acaia Pearl vs. Lunar debate.
The Acaia Pearl
Acaia’s Bluetooth-equipped Pearl is the first coffee scale from this brand, featuring the ability to measure up to 2000 grams with quick response times of about 20 milliseconds. This model works best for single cups rather than bigger drinks, but its durable waterproof casing makes it practical in home and professional environments.
This is a wireless coffee scale with a battery that lasts about 25 hours on a full charge. It also interfaces with Acaia’s apps over Bluetooth connections, although that’s mainly an extra rather than a major feature. It charges via a USB cable.
One thing that’s not obvious about this product is the several additional settings and functions, including a scale sound and a temperature unit. It also has regular coffee and espresso options to provide more information based on the type of drink you’re brewing.
Overall, the Acaia Pearl is an excellent scale for measuring coffee grounds. It’s precise enough for professional environments, lasts long enough for a full day of brewing, and has safety features like non-slip feet for extra help.
For more information on this product, see our full review of the Acaia Pearl.
The Acaia Lunar
Acaia’s Lunar is an espresso scale for commercial environments. It’s especially useful in the drip tray of espresso machines, and most of its additional features focus on supporting that.
While this Acaia scale has a simple weighing mode, its main focus is a flow mode that constantly measures weight as liquid flows into a cup. Its auto-tare function adjusts for cup weights before liquid starts flowing in, ensuring precise measurements every time.
Lunar scales ship with a heat-resistant pad, a 100-gram calibration weight, and a charging cable. This scale is precise down to 0.1 grams and can accurately weigh up to 2000 grams. It’s slightly more enduring than the Pearl, too, with a 27 hour operation time on a single charge.
We don’t have a separate review on the Lunar yet, but it’s a good option for professionals using espresso machines.
How They Compare
Choosing between these two outstanding scales is surprisingly easy, and it depends entirely on your brewing environment. In other words, there’s not much of a question in the Acaia Pearl vs. Lunar debate.
The Acaia Pearl is an excellent general scale. It works for different types of coffee, it’s durable, and it’s accurate. It’s an ideal scale for both private and commercial environments anytime you’re trying to brew a great cup of coffee, so this is the best choice for most regular buyers.
The Pearl also works better for manual brewing, especially pour-over coffee. Several of its functions and modes specialize in this, giving it impressive versatility for brewers making many types of coffee.
The Acaia Lunar is specifically for brewing espresso in professional environments. You can use it for other things, but we can’t recommend this because you can get an equally good general scale from someone else at a much lower price. There’s no point in getting a professional tool and using it for something besides its intended purpose.
The Lunar is also quite tough because it’s designed for the rougher environments of commercial espresso machine drip trays. The platform is sealed to prevent liquid entry and water-resistant, and the electronics inside have an additional coating to provide extra water resistance.
In short, get the Lunar if you’re using a professional espresso machine and get the Pearl otherwise.
This well-built, professional-grade scale also has a somewhat more extended warranty from the manufacturer, lasting two years instead of Pearl’s one year. These warranties may vary depending on where you buy the scale, though.
Alternatives
The Acaia Pearl vs. Lunar debate is settled, but they’re hardly the only coffee scales on the market.
The Coffee Gator is accurate to about 0.08 grams, more precise than either of Acaia’s scales. Outside of its precision, its durable shell makes it durable enough for high-speed kitchens. However, it’s a little larger than most other scales, which can be a problem in some environments.
Brewista’s Smart Scale II is quite small for a coffee scale, but it comes with various modes for making different types of coffee. The programmable auto-off function helps conserve battery life, while the clear display provides fast readings.
Ozeri’s Pronto kitchen scale isn’t quite dedicated to coffee, but it’s accurate enough for most purposes. Notably, this scale can handle up to 11 pounds accurately, much higher than many of its competitors, making it a great choice if you need to measure things besides coffee grounds.
These are only a few of the excellent coffee scales on the market. For more information on these (and other) products, see our in-depth guide on coffee scales.
Mastering Coffee Scales
Making a great cup of coffee requires practice, and you probably won’t master it in a day. However, understanding how to brew coffee correctly provides a great starting point for the process, including information on how factors like individual bean characteristics can affect the final cup.
Once you’re better at making coffee, you can start using coffee scales to get more precise with your measurements. Notably, using a well-built scale correctly can help you reproduce specific flavors. Even small changes in your grounds or water amounts can change how a cup of coffee tastes, so scales are essential for creating consistent flavors.
You can also experiment with Acaia’s apps to get the most from the Pearl or the Lunar. These can do things like help you create recipes or save information about your brewing habits, so you can learn to adjust them. None of these are necessary for casual home brewing, but they’re beneficial if you want to improve your skills to a professional level.
Happy Caffeinating!
