Nespresso Creatista Uno Review (2023) - Should You Consider It?

The Nespresso Creatista Uno is the base model of the Creatista line of Nespresso Machines.

It is a good looking coffee machine with many features and customization options that allow you to make espresso-based drinks as conveniently as possible.

Compared to the Creatista Plus and the Creatista Pro, it lacks premium stainless steel materials, a display, and milk customization options. These features have been omitted from the Creatista Uno in an effort to reduce the price.

Did Nespresso (Breville) find a good balance between reduced features and price?

Read this Nespresso Creatista Uno review to find out!

Specifications

• Line: OriginalLine
  
  
• Display: None
  
  
• Materials: Plastic
  
  
• Colors: Black sesame
  
  
• Dimensions (WxDxH): 6.7 x 16.1 x 12.2 inches
  
  
• Weight: 11.5 pounds
  
  
• Water Tank: 50.7 oz removable
  
  
• Spent Capsule Capacity: 10 capsules
  
  
• Power Rating: 1600 Watts

Key Features

• Brew Pressure: 19 bar
  
  
• Heat-up time: 3 seconds
  
  
• Brewing Sizes: Ristretto (0.85 oz), Espresso (1.35 oz), and Lungo (3.7 oz)
  
  
• Customizable Brew Sizes? Yes
  
  
• Pre-programmed drinks: 3 (ristretto, espresso, lungo)
  
  
• Milk System: Fully Automatic Steam Wand & Milk Jug
  
  
• Milk Settings: 3 texture levels and 3 temperature settings
  
  
• Milk Jug: Stainless Steel 16.9 oz Jug with Spout
  
  
• Hot Water Dispenser? No
  
  
• Auto-off: 9 minutes
  
  
• Cleaning: Auto-clean system, milk wand auto-purge, descaling alarm
  
  
• Suitable for Latte Art? Yes
  
  
• Warranty: 2 years

Nespresso Creatista Uno Review

Design and Build Quality

The Nespresso Creatista Uno has a good-looking design that comes in Black Sesame color with some touches of chrome - the coffee dispenser, steam wand, and capsule lever are in chrome color.

On top of this Nespresso coffee machine, you will find the control panel which consists of 6 buttons and 4 sets of LED lights to indicate cleaning alerts and display the milk settings.

Although this machine looks good, it does not look as great as the Creatista Plus and Creatista Pro. These two machines come with external stainless steel materials and beautiful HD color screens.

So the Creatista Uno won't have the wow factor that the Creatista Plus and Pro would have on your kitchen counter, despite its very similar design.

One such similar design aspect is the pop-out drip tray beneath the coffee dispenser. This is a great feature for smaller drinks as the smaller vertical clearance helps keep the coffee hot.

Another similar feature is its large 50.7 oz removable water tank, which sits behind the machine. The tank itself is not very attractive so it is a good thing it's hidden by the machine itself.

Features and Ease of Use

The Nespresso Creatista Uno comes with many features to customize your coffee drinks and make your life easier when making them.

Despite its lack of a screen, the Creatista Uno's control panel, consisting of 6 buttons and 4 LED lights, makes this an intuitive machine to use.

Amongst its most impressive features is the 3-second heat-up time. It is one of the fastest warm-up times we've seen.

This Nespresso machine brews three main sizes of espresso drinks. By default, it brews ristretto (0.85 oz), espresso (1.35 oz), and lungo (3.7 oz).

These default brew sizes can also be customized to suit your taste, as follows:

• Ristretto: 0.5 to 1 oz
  
  
• Espresso: 1 to 2.3 oz
  
  
• Lungo: 2.3 to 4.4 oz

Another great feature of the Creatista Uno is its fully automatic milk wand system, which can easily be customized by pressing the milk temperature and milk froth levels buttons. For each of these settings, there are 3 levels to choose from.

With the right milk type, you could get micro-foam that is good enough for latte art. And that is possible given the separate steam wand and stainless steel milk jug.

There are a total of three pre-programmed drinks you can choose from. These are the ristretto, espresso, and lungo drinks.

However, this does not mean this machine can't prepare other drinks. For milk recipes, the process is a bit more manual than other Nespresso machines.

After the coffee extraction is done, you can then have to select the milk temperature and froth settings. It is the frothed milk levels that define what your drink will be. For example, as per the Nespresso Creatista Uno Manual, you would select milk froth level #1 for flat whites, milk froth level #2 for cappuccino, and froth level #3 for latte macchiato.

Finally, it is worth mentioning this coffee machine is part of the Nespresso OriginalLine. This means you won't be able to prepare regular coffee.

That's something the VertuoLine Nespresso machines are more adept at.

Coffee Drink Quality

The 19-bar pump pressure of the OriginalLine Nespresso machines (which includes this one) will ensure you have a bold espresso shot every time.

Another advantage of the OriginalLine Nespresso machines is that they are compatible with third-party capsules.

So you won't be stuck using coffee types dictated by whatever type of Nespresso pods are available.

You could even get refillable Nespresso pods to further improve your coffee drink quality.

This allows you to buy fresh whole beans, grind them, fill the capsule, and use it with your Creatista Uno.

Within the realm of capsule machines, this one prepares amongst the best micro-foams. Breville's automatic milk frothing technology is maturing to the extent we are seeing them now in relatively low-end machines such as this one.

Only the Nespresso Creatista Plus and Creatista Pro steam milk better amongst the Nespresso machines lineup.

In short, although you won't get barista-quality coffee, the Creatista Uno, through its technologies, customization options, and potential to use any type of coffee (with refillable coffee capsules), can make a descent cup of third-wave coffee!

Cleaning & Maintenance

The design of this Nespresso machine allows you to easily clean this machine.

The removable drip tray, water tank, and capsule container make it easy to rinse and dry these components. This is something you should do every day as part of your regular cleaning, as recommended by Nespresso.

Obviously, if you use the milk jug you should clean it with a damp cloth after every use. Remember that bacteria love milk!

This brings us to the auto-purge feature of the milk wand. After you prepare milk-based coffees, it'll automatically purge to rinse itself.

You can also do a deep cleaning of the steam wand using the pin cleaning tool, included with this Nespresso machine. You can remove the steam wand tip, and using the pin cleaning tool, unclog each hole.

You can also remove the steam tip cap, which reveals some of the wand's inner components that like to collect milk. You can rinse both the cap and steam tip to ensure all milk is removed.

The Nespresso Creatista Uno also prompts you when it needs descaling. When its descale alert LED is flashing, simply run the descaling program which takes about 15 minutes to complete.

In summary, the Nespresso Creatista Uno can easily be cleaned and maintained, thanks to its auto-clean and auto-purge cycles, as well as its LED indicators telling you when it's time to pay some attention to your Nespresso baby.

Value for Money

The versatile coffee machine offers very good value for money.

At the time of writing, this machine costs about $450, which is about $200 less than the Creatista Plus which has better looks, materials, and more hot milk settings.

This is a good tradeoff between cost and features, especially since the coffee drink quality is only slightly compromised due to having fewer milk customization settings.

Still, this is a great espresso machine that prepares very good coffee and milk based drinks at a very reasonable cost.

Assuming you drink one coffee per day, and knowing each capsule costs about $0.80, the first year of owning this machine will cost about $750. This is way less than purchasing a $3 to $4 specialty coffee per day, costing in contrast $1,100 to $1,450!

You can even mitigate the cost of coffee pods if you decide to use re-fillable ones.

Your wallet and the environment will thank you!

Our Verdict

Nespresso Creatista Uno

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