De’Longhi Dinamica Plus review: the perfect indulgence for coffee fanatics
With an extensive coffee menu that will rival your favourite coffee shop, the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus is a great investment for those who are serious about coffee. And it is a serious investment, too, with an RRP of over £1000. You can buy some of the best coffee machines we’ve tried for as little as £100, but if you care about finding a fully automatic machine that’s easy to use and capable of making all manner of lattes, americanos, and even macchiatos, it’s a top-shelf machine that will get a lot of use in your home.
When I started reviewing the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus in my own kitchen I was drinking an average of one coffee a day, but the convenience of customising my morning and mid-afternoon brew has slowly ramped that up to three, at least! Another big win is that I can add my own ground decaff coffee without needing to disrupt my regular coffee beans. From its compact footprint to its easily customisable beverages, the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus is the best bean-to-cup coffee machine I’ve tried.
Ideal Home rated 5 out of 5 stars
Reasons to buy:
- Fully automatic systems
- Compatible with an app
- Customisable presets
- High quality milk frother
- Sensitive bean grinding, with adjustable strength levels
Reasons to avoid:
- It is an expensive option
De’Longhi Dinamica Plus
De’Longhi Dinamica Plus fully automatic espresso machine
Specs:
- Coffee type: beans or ground
- Control type: digital
- Water tank capacity: 1.8 litres
- Pressure: 19 bar
- Power: 1450kW
- Power cord length: 0.7 metres
- Dimensions: H34.8 x W23.6 x D42.9 cm
- Weight: 11.93kg
Getting started with the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus
The De’Longhi Dinamica Plus came in a hefty box, but I was pleased to find that there was next-to-no assembly needed. The water tank and ground dispenser are both housed at the front of the machine for easy removable, and the bean grinder is at the rear of the machine, with a low enough profile to be easily topped up with beans.
The machine is fully automatic. You slot the milk dispenser onto the front left side of the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus, and if you don’t care for frothed milk, you can push a hot water dispenser into the front of the machine instead.
The milk dispenser has a LatteCrema system, which is designed to deliver robust and fine foam and frothed milk. This is fully adjustable using a dial at the top of the milk dispenser, with three levels of froth. When you choose your coffee setting you will be instructed to turn the dial to the right one for your coffee, and you can then switch it to the clean setting to rinse out the mixing device after you’re finished.
Making coffee in the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus
The touch display on the front of the Dinamica Plus shows a full menu of different drinks. There are the regular latte, americano, espresso and cappuccino modes, but you can also make a macchiato (the traditional way) or a latte macchiato, if you have a penchant for the Starbucks variety.
The aroma and size of the drink is fully adjustable, too. Simply press the bean and cup size buttons to toggle through five levels of strength, and five different cup sizes. The cup size will depend on the specific drink you’re making, so a large espresso will not be the same size as a large latte. I ended up buying the De’Longhi coffee cups that are shown in the illustrations on the digital screen, which made adjusting the size a lot easier, but it will take some time to get used to the specific size that suits your personal mugs.
The bean grinder has a capacity of 300 grams, which is the average size of most smaller coffee bags, and you can also lift up the hatch to pour in coffee grounds, a scoop at a time, to make decaf coffees. This was great for my mid-afternoon cappuccinos, although I did have to buy the coffee ground because the machine can only grind one type of bean at a time.
Customising your drinks
You can customise your coffee to your own personal preference, and save it to your profile to easily make the perfect coffee for you. The De’Longhi Dinamica Plus has four profiles to choose from, and you can still customise your aroma and size of the coffee even when on your personal profile. Just press the ‘my’ button to revert to your saved preferences.
Adjusting your ideal coffee is very easy to do. You simply change the aroma for your own liking, and then press stop when your mug is full. This is trickier when making a milky coffee, because you need to leave room for all the coffee you want to top up the coffee. When it’s done, you can save your preference, which means you will always have the perfect size coffee to fill your favourite mug.
Image credit: De’Longhi
The coffee’s made in the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus are picture-perfect, with a cross-section that shows the different strengths and levels of your coffee. I also enjoyed the way it handled my favourite beans, which were not burnt or bitter after extraction in the 19-bar machine. The flavour was well-rounded, and my latte macchiato foam was firm and well-formed.
As a former barista I do enjoy frothing my own milk by hand and working on my latte art. You’ll get no such opportunity with the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus, because the milk dispenses and is then topped up by the coffee machine.
You can pour two cups of coffee at once, but you can’t make two milky coffees simultaneously because there is only one dispenser.
Pairing the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus with the app
You can easily pair with the app on Bluetooth, which will give you the full menu and allow you to adjust everything completely, from the volume of coffee (in milliliters) to the seconds spent dispensing milk.
The temperature is also adjustable in the app, so you get some expanded functions you won’t find with the machine alone. You do need to change the dial to dispense milk and add a mug to top up your drink, so much like the Lavazza Voicy, this smart coffee machine still needs tending to.
Image credit; De’Longhi
Cleaning
Cleaning the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus is very easy. You pull out the grounds bin from the drip tray to empty both out, and the tray can go in the dishwasher. The milk dispenser can, too, and it’s a good idea to keep it very well refrigerated when there’s milk left between coffees. The dispenser cannot go in the dishwasher, but the milk carafe itself can.
Should you buy the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus
Image credit: De’Longhi
While it is an expensive coffee machine, the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus has a brilliant design that makes it the perfect investment for coffee lovers. It has four profiles, which means it is brilliantly designed for families, and while it is not quite as compact as the Cuisinart Veloce Bean-to-Cup coffee machine, it is still a decent size to not take up the entirety of your kitchen counter.
My only slight complaint is that you can only make one milky coffee at a time with the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus, because the milk dispenser will pour into one cup only. You can easily do two milky coffees back-to-back, and realistically you will make your coffees one at a time anyway, but it is a slight difference when compared to the De’Longhi Maestosa.
If you want a smart coffee machine to smarten up the kitchen counters, the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus is an easy five-star option. It will do any coffee bean justice, and the milk dispenser makes perfect steamed milk.
About this review, and our reviewer
Millie Fender is small appliances editor at Ideal Home. She reviews everything from coffee machines to air fryers from her own kitchen, meaning these tests have been carried out in the same conditions that you’ll be using the machine.
The De’Longhi Dinamica Plus was kindly sent to Millie by De’Longhi, and Millie tested for a month before writing this review. This gave her the chance to test all of its functions as well as cleaning and check for any troubleshooting. While she prefers a frothy latte or an iced cappuccino, her partner is never running on less than three americanos, so the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus was very thoroughly tested.
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