No matter what your coffee routine looks like these days—chaotic, dialed-in, or somewhere in between—a new year is the perfect excuse to level it up. Start 2026 with a fresh calendar, fresh goals, and even fresher coffee.
Here are the Tag Coffee team’s top ideas for brewing better coffee at home—even adopting just one of these tips is guaranteed to improve your daily cup.
1. Invest in additional brewing equipment.
There’s a place in every kitchen for the trusty old drip machine. But to treat yourself, add some other brewing methods to your repertoire. Even if you only use these occasionally—like on weekends, or on work-from-home days—you’ll appreciate having the brewing variety. Our favorites are the classic AeroPress Original Coffee Maker and the V60 Coffee Maker and Decanter. We’ve got both in-stock right now if you’re ready to branch out.
2. Get the right grind size.
Did you know that the coarseness of your grind plays a huge role in making excellent coffee? For example, for espresso, you want an extremely fine grind so that your machine can extract the right amount of flavor in a short brew time. Meanwhile, a Chemex works best with a coarse grind, while a drip coffee machine needs grounds that are more fine than that. So to get better results, consider investing in a grinder with settings that match various brew methods. Or, to make things even easier, choose your grind level when you purchase any bag of Tag Coffee—we’ll send your coffee grounds prepared at a Coarse, Medium or Fine level.
3. Buy beans at peak freshness.
If you’ve ever purchased cheap coffee, you’ll see that there’s no “roasted on” date on the package—only an expiration date. That’s because the coffee was usually roasted months earlier and has now lost much of its natural flavor. Ideally, you should brew coffee within 1-3 weeks after roasting to achieve the best taste. At Tag, we have you covered: we roast coffee beans every single day, ship those fresh beans to you quickly, and include a “roasted on” date on every bag for freshly roasted coffee.
4. Mix it up with different coffee varieties.
There’s a concept in the world of car collecting called the “daily driver.” (Don’t worry, we don’t have a car collection either.) Anyway, the thought is that you need a daily driver vehicle that you can take anywhere and everywhere, but you should also have some cars in your garage that are just for the fun of driving. Building a coffee selection is like that, too. We all have our go-to morning blends, but we deserve to treat ourselves with some surprising and experimental choices. So this year, venture out with some Wild & Adventurous coffees, like our single origins. Or for a truly surprising experience, start a Clubhouse subscription to receive coffees you can’t get anywhere else.
5. Wash your filters.
Brewing with a method that requires a paper filter? True connoisseurs wash their filters before they brew. This helps to avoid any paper flavor in your brewed coffee and can also help the filter stick to the brewing container. It’s simple: just gently flush the filter with warm tap water before brewing. Even if you don’t feel like there’s paper taste in your coffee currently, pre-wetting your filter lets more of the coffee’s goodness go into your cup, rather than soaking into (and staying in) your filter.
6. Stir your coffee.
After you brew, give your coffee a stir. Do this every single time, regardless of brewing method—it’s the easiest way to make an instant improvement to your coffee. Just like the sedimentary rock you saw in science class, coffee brews in order of solubility and rests in layers inside your decanter. By stirring the coffee, you mix those layers together and distribute all the flavors evenly. If you don’t stir the coffee, you’ll notice that your first cup is bittersweet and your last cup is pale and tart.
Brewing a great cup of coffee doesn’t have to be complicated—just intentional. A few small habits, the right tools, and fresher beans can completely transform your daily ritual. Try adding one or two of these upgrades to your routine and see how quickly they make a difference! And whenever you want to explore new beans or new gear, the Tag Coffee team is always here to help you brew better.
