What's Your Roast Level: Light, Medium, or Dark?

When buying coffee beans, you might often see descriptions like light roast, medium roast, or dark roast. This refers to the roast level, which has a huge impact on the flavor in your cup, even for the same coffee beans.

What is Roast Level?

Roast level indicates how long and how hot the coffee beans are roasted. The longer the beans are roasted, the darker they become, the less acidic they taste, and the more bitter and roasted flavors dominate.

Light Roast

• Color: light brown.
• Flavor: more acidic, light, and the coffee's natural characteristics shine through, such as fruit, floral, or tea notes.
• Suitable for: manual brews like V60 and black coffee.

Medium Roast

• Color: medium brown.
• Flavor: balanced between sweet, acidic, and bitter, with hints of chocolate or caramel.
• Suitable for: almost any brewing method, including filter, French press, and espresso. A safe choice for beginners.

Dark Roast

• Color: dark brown to almost black.
• Flavor: bitter, full-bodied, and very low acidity with smoky or rich chocolate aromas.
• Suitable for: coffee with milk, espresso, tubruk coffee, and those who like a strong coffee flavor.

Which One Should You Choose?

1. You like fresh and fruity flavors: go for light roast.
2. You want something balanced and versatile: choose medium roast.
3. You prefer rich, bitter, and with milk: opt for dark roast.

There's no one 'right' roast level. The best choice is what suits your taste and brewing method. If you're still unsure, try small packs of different roast levels and compare.

Find Your Perfect Coffee at Jam Kopi

Not sure what to choose? Use our Find Your Coffee feature to get recommendations tailored to your taste, or browse all products ranging from arabika Gayo, arabika Solok, robusta, to house blend Sumatra.