Best eco-friendly and compostable coffee pods

Although convenient, the environmental impact of lots of individual pods can quickly add up, especially if you're having multiple coffees a day. Whilst most coffee pods were originally plastic or aluminium (not always easy to recycle), there are now a range of eco-friendly pods that are compostable, biodegradable and easier to recycle. You can still enjoy a wide range of different coffees – including rare, single-origin and decaf coffee blends – whilst being a little kinder on the environment.

Our coffee expert Celeste Wong tested a range of eco-friendly pods to find the best on the market – these are her top 10 picks.

Best eco-friendly coffee pods at a glance

• Best coffee pods with sweeter notes: Pact Coffee, from £9.95 for 14
• Best GMO-free coffee pods: Volcano Coffee Works, from £6.50 for a pack of 10
• Best straight forward coffee pods: Grind, £9.95 for a pack of 20
• Best selection pack of coffee pods: Caravan, £5 for a pack of 10
• Best carbon negative coffee pods: Kiss The Hippo, from £18 for 30
• Best for Americano-style coffee: Lavazza Eco-caps, from £4.99 for a pack of 16
• Best coffee pods for information: Hermanos, from £7 for pack of 10
• Best coffee pods for espresso: Penningtons Coffee Roasters, from £5.40 for a pack of 10
• Best for rare ranges of coffee: Colonna Coffee, from £24 for a box of 10
• Best easy compostable option: Lost Sheep Coffee, from £15 for a pack of 30

Best eco-friendly coffee pods to buy 2024

Pact Coffee

• Available from Pact Coffee (from £9.95)

Best coffee pods with sweeter notes

Pact Coffee has a range of pods to choose from: browse by roast, origin or flavour profile to find one that suits your taste. The colourful packaging is a welcome delivery and the mixed box selection of 40 pods contains all four origins of coffee capsules to give you some variety. Pods are 100% recyclable, and a ‘pods and recycler bundle’ is available containing an Ecofriendly Pod Recycler to ensure the pods are accurately disposed of.

There are detailed, accurate tasting notes on the box. My two favourites were the Rwanda and Honduras: the Rwanda pod is described as ‘raspberries and cream’ and this coffee certainly had a raspberry-style acidity and a creamy mouthfeel. The Honduras was bright and fruity, great as an espresso. The Brazil and Columbian pods would suit people who enjoy the more chocolatey, nutty and rich notes from an espresso.

Available from:
Pact Coffee (from £9.95)

Volcano Coffee Works

• Available from Volcano Coffee Works (from £6.50 for pack of 10)

Best GMO-free coffee pods

Volcano Coffee Works offers four pod choices, including decaf. All are ethically sourced, biodegradable and vegan-friendly. Pods are made from 100% compostable, GMO-free, bio-based material derived from sugarcane. There is a multi-pack of 200 capsules for £100 which is a good option for offices, studios or the multiple times a day espresso drinker. You can also sign up for subscriptions with many variations of frequency, starting with a 40 pack or more and free delivery.

I tried Volcano's Balanced pods, which also have the Great Taste 2019 seal of approval. The espresso is strikingly balanced, and while there is no recommendation whether to drink the coffee best as an espresso or lungo, the lungo was equally enjoyable. The words ‘biodegradable & compostable’ are printed on the pods, which adds a helpful reminder when using. Volcano reassures you that the pods will be biodegraded in about 90 days – it feels really good to know a time limit on when compostable pods are actually decomposed by.

Available from:
Volcano Coffee Works (from £6.50 for pack of 10 pods)

Grind

• Available from Amazon (£25.50 for 60 pods), Grind (from £9.95 for 20 pods)

Best straightforward coffee pods

Grind offers house, light, dark or decaf pods, all of which come in a refillable (and recyclable), chic Grind branded tin. When you subscribe to the pods, you get a free tin, 20% off and free shipping. All your pods after that come in letter-box friendly boxes.

Grind coffee is certified organic, ethically sourced and plastic-free. The compostable coffee pods are made from biodegradable bioplastic, while the lid is made of PLA and paper – Grind specifies the pods will break down within six weeks in industrial compost. What I like about the offering is that it feels really simple.

I tried out the House blend capsules, which is the same blend used in the Grind cafés. There’s limited information on the packaging, and they don’t actually disclose the origins of the beans anywhere easily that I can see. If you like milky coffees, I would definitely recommend drinking this capsule with milk, which I preferred over drinking it black. If you are strictly a black coffee drinker, I’d suggest trying the light or dark capsules.

Available from:
Amazon (£25.50 for 60 pods)
Grind (from £9.95 for 20 pods)

Caravan

• Available from Caravan (from £13.50), Waitrose (£5 for pack of 10)

Best selection pack of coffee pods

Caravan has gained popularity thanks to its day-to-night dining in London, and boasts great food menus to accompany their reputable coffee.

It's recently launched three types of compostable coffee pods: The Daily (an all day blend), The Market (organic house blend) and Decaf (anytime blend). It’s not stated where the beans are from, other than that they are arabica beans. Each box holds 10 capsules, and when ordering direct online, you have four option packs: 30, 50, 100 or a bulk buy of 200, which is quite affordable for small offices or households that drink pod coffee regularly. You can purchase one of each type in a combo pack if you want to try all three.

I like the bright colours of the compact packaging, and my favourite is the Market organic house blend, which has good base notes and light sweetness.

Available from:
Caravan (from £13.50)
Waitrose (£5 for pack of 10)

Kiss the Hippo

• Available from Amazon (£18 for 30), Kiss the Hippo (from £11 for 20)

Best carbon negative coffee pods

Kiss the Hippo offers three different coffee pods: Organic House Blend (sweet and strong), Organic Classic Blend (darker and more intense in flavour) and Organic Decaf. All are organic-certified, ethically sourced, 100% compostable, plastic-free and completely carbon negative – a huge eco-friendly asset, going beyond just carbon-neutral. Pods are available in packs of 20 or 30, plus you can subscribe to packs of 30 and save 15%. For every subscription, Kiss the Hippo plant a tree in partnership with On a Mission. Packaging is minimal, clean and neat.

The House Blend was my favourite: the coffee was bright and very sweet tasting, with a little acidity to lighten the espresso. The Organic Classic blend from the Americas tastes bolder than the house blend and produced a solid lungo. The decaf was really pleasant: the espresso is sweet, light in body and mouth feel, and doesn’t leave a bitter aftertaste. An excellent option for decaf drinkers – and even handy for impromptu espresso martinis! Overall, really enjoyable and drinkable.

Available from:
Kiss the Hippo (from £11 for 20 pods)
Amazon (from £18 for 30 pods)

Lavazza Eco-caps

Best for Americano-style coffee

Lavazza offers five styles of eco-capsules: Espresso Deciso, Lungo Intenso, Espresso Armonico, Lungo Avvolgente and Bio-Organic. Each type has a helpful intensity rating and a specific guide to how long to extract the shot. Lavazza runs foundation projects focused on helping farmers and communities with their infrastructure and production to yield and supply higher quality coffees, encourage more women in coffee, and implement sustainable practices. It is worth noting that Lavazza has its own design of machine, with a different shaped capsule to classic Nespresso.

While these may not be as complex or delicate as some of the other capsules, I like that it's clear which pods should be used for either espresso or lungo. The Espresso Decisio is creamy and much less bitter than I expected, with a sweet aftertaste. It’s bold and a strong shot of espresso for the morning. The Lungo Intenso was smooth and would suit an Americano style coffee. In the past, Lavazza coffees in its commercial range have been a bit dark or bitter for me, however these capsules were a pleasant surprise comparatively.

Hermanos

• Available from Hermanos (from £7 for 10 pods)

Best coffee pods for information

At the end of 2023, Hermanos Colombian Coffee Roasters released its new coffee capsule range. There are three capsules to choose from: Maria Torres, Hacienda El Calapo and El Condor Decaf (which I've also tried as beans). I also recommend keeping decaf pods on hand for those spontaneous espresso martini nights, too.

I tried the Maria Torres and Hacienda capsules, and both were really lovely. Hermanos takes pride in championing the farms it works with. The pods come in long, narrow boxes with a small blurb on the farmer's story, which gives a little insight into how the beans are grown, and you can see the level of body, acidity and sweetness of the different pods.

My favourite is the Maria Torres, which has some caramel sweetness and soft acidity. And, even though it's marked on the box as level ¼ for body, I thought it was good and not too low. Online, there's ample information about the coffee process, location, production, drying method, varietals and roast. Compared to some other pods, these work out to be approximately 10-20p more per pod than some others on the list, but these are high-quality.

Available from:
Hermanos (from £7 for 10 pods)

Penningtons Coffee Roasters and Tea Merchants

• Available from Penningtons Coffee (from £5.40 for 10)

Best coffee pods for espresso

Penningtons, based in the Lake District, has multiple eco-friendly claims: they use power exclusively from renewable sources, recycled packing materials for deliveries and recycle the majority of any waste. Its range of 100% compostable pods is available in a Brazil Espresso roast and a decaffeinated option, plus there are subscription options for regular deliveries.

We tested the Brazil Cerrado, an espresso roast, with caramel, dark chocolate and nutty notes. They come in a simple brown box and in two compostable bags holding five pods each, flushed with nitrogen for maximum freshness. This was a nice drinkable subtle espresso, and I would recommend drinking this as an espresso because it might lose its flavour if too much milk is added. A smooth, sweet and nutty drop.

Available from:
Penningtons Coffee (from £5.40 for 10 pods)

Colonna Coffee capsules

• Available from Colonna Coffee (from £24 for 40 pods)
  

Best for rare ranges of coffee

Colonna Coffee, roasted in Bath, is renowned for its rare and interesting origins of coffee beans and has been able to transfer this ethos to its pod selection seamlessly. This was one of the largest ranges of specialty compostable and eco-capsules I’ve seen, all of which are Nespresso-compatible. Almost everything offered in traditional bean is available in something similar or of the same quality but as a capsule. Compostable capsules are split into three categories: Africa, Americas, and ‘limited release’, while decaf capsules are made of aluminium to be recycled.

I tried out the compostable limited release Rare Columbian Gesha. I was excited to try this and the results didn’t disappoint. The intoxicating aroma is distinctively bold cherry, with blackberry and floral qualities. Colonna’s recommendation is to drink this as an 80g lungo. The information on the box highlights that the capsules are nitrogen flushed for optimum freshness.

This range is the most expensive of the pods, but it really is something special, so if you’re looking for something exquisite to try I would highly recommend this. If you are a strictly black coffee drinker and appreciate trying different flavours of espresso, then Colonna is a range you’ll want to look into.

Available from:
Colonna Coffee (from £24 for 40 pods)

Lost Sheep Coffee

• Available from Lost Sheep Coffee (from £15 for 30 pods)

Best easy compostable option

Lost Sheep, based in Whitstable, produces small-batch, hand-roasted capsules. It offers two main coffee origins, a decaf and a half caffeine pod called Fifty Fifty for those who are a bit more sensitive to caffeine – great for late afternoon coffees, and an option I haven’t seen offered anywhere else. Pods are available in packs of 10, 60 or a ‘mega box’ of 100, and there are subscription options for the 60 and 100 packs.

Pods are industrially compostable and free from oil-based plastics. The best thing for home users is that Lost Sheep explicitly says the capsules are designed to compost when placed inside your local authority food waste caddy. Comparatively, branded Nespresso pods are inconvenient to recycle where there are different options to have them recycled.

Pods come in a range of flavours – I tested the Smooth Journey capsules. These do what they say: it’s smooth but strong at the same time. The pack itself is packed with information including details about the roastery and where the coffee is from. It also gives a recommendation as to which button to use on your machine, for this one it suggests espresso over lungo. Even as a lungo the coffee doesn’t taste over-extracted, and if you do want to take the edge off a straight up espresso, the lungo is nice. But they are right, as an espresso it is vibrant and punchy, but smooth.

Available from:
Lost Sheep Coffee (from £15 for 30 pods)

How Celeste Wong tested the coffee pods

All pods reviewed are Nespresso compatible: I tested using a Nespresso Inissa Pod machine. I tried all pods as a short espresso (approx. 30ml) and a lungo (80-110ml). Although coffee can be extracted longer, I personally wouldn’t recommend it as each pod only contains around 5-8grams of coffee, so you run the risk of over-extracting and that's when flavour is dulled and the bitterness can creep in.

Some pods specifically say how they are to be brewed, which I followed. I rinsed my mouth between each pod tasting.

Want to learn more about becoming an expert at-home barista? Read our guides here:

Celeste Wong's guide to becoming an overnight coffee expert
Celeste Wong's guide on how to make iced coffee

Celeste Wong's guide on sustainable coffee
Celeste Wong's best moka pots
Celeste Wong's best coffee grinders
Celeste Wong's best decaf coffee to try
Celeste Wong's best gooseneck kettles to try
Celeste Wong's best coffee beans to try
Celeste Wong's best cafetières to buy
Celeste Wong's best coffee bags

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This review was last updated in March 2024. If you have any questions, suggestions for future reviews or spot anything that has changed in price or availability, please get in touch at oliveweb@immediate.co.uk.