Sage Oracle Dual Boiler Review
Sage has long had the Oracle in its lineup, positioned as the brand’s most premium and capable coffee machine for home baristas. But as Sage’s range has expanded and new features have arrived across the Barista Express and Impress models, the original Oracle began to feel like it was missing a few modern touches.
Sage clearly thought that too, as they have completely reimagined it with the all-new Sage £2495 Oracle Dual Boiler coffee machine, a fully automatic, dual-boiler espresso machine designed to deliver café-quality coffee at home with minimal effort. It promises every bell and whistle you’d expect at this level, blending serious coffee hardware with clever automation in a way only Sage really does.
Design
The first thing you notice with the Sage Oracle Dual Boiler is scale. Everything feels upsized compared to the Barista Express and Barista Impress machines we have at the studio. The portafilter baskets are wider, the group head is broader, the steam wand is chunkier, and even the bean hopper stands taller. It all adds to the sense that this is a more serious piece of kit. But it only takes a few additional cm’s of worktop space, so not a problem.
Aesthetically, it leans into softer, curvier lines too. There’s something almost mid-century about it, a subtle 1950's flair that makes it feel less industrial and more intentional. This isn’t a machine you tuck away; it’s very much a centrepiece appliance, whether that’s in a kitchen or a studio space.
The move to a touchscreen helps streamline the overall look, doing away with clusters of buttons and control dials. It undeniably adds a layer of simplicity, though in daily use we found ourselves wiping it down constantly. Fingerprints stand out clearly when the machine is idling, which slightly detracts from the otherwise clean presentation. There’s also noticeably more stainless steel this time around. The top cup-warming area and the lower side panels both incorporate it, and it’s genuinely nice to interact with. As with every Sage product we’ve reviewed, the build quality is reassuringly solid, heavy, robust and confidence-inspiring.
One small but very welcome design upgrade is the addition of wheels underneath the machine. These can be locked or unlocked via a lever hidden under the drip tray at the front. It makes manoeuvring the Oracle Dual Boiler on a worktop far easier. You are still able to move the water tank from behind, but it doesn’t lift upwards; instead, it pops out horizontally, which is far less practical. So for those who don’t want to remove the water tank, there’s a door on the top of the machine; simply press it and it gently opens itself to reveal the reservoir where you can pour water directly, which then feeds down into the tank below. It’s a genuinely user-friendly solution and is the only way we top-up now.
One missed opportunity, however, is the bean hopper. There’s no option to load or switch between two different bean types, meaning you can’t easily alternate between caffeinated and decaf. On a machine at this level, that would have been a genuinely useful feature.
Cleaning & Maintenance
The drip tray on the Sage Oracle Dual Boiler feels larger and more compactly designed than those on Sage’s smaller Barista machines, and it’s very easy to remove and empty. It also breaks down into individual components, making routine cleaning straightforward. There aren’t too many awkward crevices where injection-moulded parts meet — something Sage machines can sometimes suffer from — which helps keep things hygienic without much effort.
Day-to-day upkeep is helped by the increased use of stainless steel. The machine itself, along with the polished backsplash element, wipes down easily, though it does show marks. Keeping a stainless steel cleaner on hand is worthwhile if you want it looking its best, as fingerprints and water splashes are part of daily life with a machine like this.
When it comes to deeper maintenance, descaling and cleaning cycles are handled in much the same way as other Sage machines, but with a welcome upgrade. Instead of relying on indicator lights, the Oracle Dual Boiler alerts you via the touchscreen display when it’s time to run cleaning tablets or descaling solutions through the system. The process is fully guided, automated, and takes around 10–20 minutes to complete.
In our use, these cleaning prompts tend to appear every six to eight weeks. Because the process is so hands-off, there’s little reason to put it off — another small but meaningful way the Oracle Dual Boiler reduces friction in day-to-day ownership.
Touch Screen and Setup
When you first power on the Sage Oracle Dual Boiler, you’re guided through a setup process on the 5.7” touch screen that feels more like configuring an iPhone than a coffee machine. It’s intuitive, clearly laid out, and sets expectations early that this is a far more digitally led experience than Sage’s previous machines.
One of the first calibration steps asks for your water hardness. Sage includes a test strip in the box, and based in Cornwall, we assumed we’d be looking at the lowest reading. Instead, it surprised us with a two-bar result out of five — a small reminder of why this step matters. The machine then adjusts itself accordingly, helping with scale management and long-term performance without you having to think too much about it.
As with so much modern tech, physical controls have largely been removed. The familiar buttons are gone, and even the grind size dials found on Sage’s other machines have disappeared. Everything is now handled through the touchscreen, which is a bold move. The tactility of the buttons on machines like the Barista Express and Impress has always been a big part of why they’re so approachable, so introducing a layer of glass between you and the coffee felt like a risk.
After living with the Oracle Dual Boiler for over a month, we’ve been pleasantly surprised. The touchscreen responds quickly, there’s no noticeable lag, and the interface is easy to navigate without feeling buried in menus. Selecting a drink reveals its own set of customisation options — from grind and dose through to milk texture, and once you’ve dialled things in, those recipes can be saved for quick access later. It’s not all perfect though; we have noticed glitches when it comes to milk temperature after we alter away from the recommended one, as it often stays at the prior number on the screen. Things like this we hope get resolved with software updates.
Making Espresso
At the heart of the Sage Oracle Dual Boiler is its Auto Dial-In system, which uses brewing time, grind coarseness and extraction feedback to continually adjust itself in pursuit of the ideal espresso. Each time you introduce a new bean or roast, the machine begins learning almost immediately. You can actually see this happening: over the first three to five brews, the grind setting subtly shifts, bobbing back and forth as the Oracle works things out. It continues to make smaller adjustments as the beans age, too.
What’s interesting is that these changes aren’t just theoretical. The taste does shift as the system settles, but the biggest giveaway is visual. Watching the pour tells you almost everything — flow rate, colour and crema formation all quickly reveal when the espresso has landed in the sweet spot.
Sage calls this the Auto Puck System, powered by an electronic grind adjustment mechanism that automatically grinds, doses and tamps each puck for consistency before extraction. The grinder itself uses fully integrated Baratza European precision burrs, offering 45 grind settings that the machine can adjust automatically. In practice, this means every puck is prepared in exactly the same way, removing a huge amount of human variability from the process.
In terms of outright espresso quality, beans we know well produce results very much on par with the Barista Express and Barista Impress models. That’s not a criticism — those machines already make excellent espresso, some of the best we’ve had from any at-home coffee machines. The Oracle Dual Boiler, though, excels at consistency, especially for newcomers, delivering rich, creamy shots with beautiful crema, plenty of oil expression and impressively stable temperature.
So what sets it apart isn’t that the espresso is dramatically better, but how little effort it takes to get there. We thought the Barista Impress removed much of the hard work involved in pulling a great shot, but the Oracle Dual Boiler goes further still. All you really need to do is escort the portafilter from the grinder to the group head; the machine handles grinding, dosing, tamping and extraction with a level of precision and repeatability that feels almost effortless. Yes, you can dive into the manual geekiness — adjusting temperature, grind and dose — but once you’ve experienced the automation getting it right so consistently, it’s unlikely you’ll feel the need. We certainly didn’t.
Texturing Milk
Because the Sage Oracle Dual Boiler automates so much of the process, it makes direct comparison with the Barista Express and Barista Impress models almost unavoidable — particularly when it comes to milk texturing, which on those machines is entirely manual. Where the Oracle Dual Boiler immediately pulls ahead is speed. Watching it steam milk feels very similar to observing a barista at work in a busy café: fast, purposeful and over in seconds. It’s not quite commercial-machine fast, but it easily feels two to three times quicker than the other Sage machines we have here. If you’re making multiple drinks back-to-back, that time saving really adds up.
That speed also highlights the benefit of the dual-boiler design. The Oracle Dual Boiler can texture milk and brew espresso at the same time, which not only accelerates workflow but also opens up more flexibility. You can pull an espresso for an Americano while steaming milk for a hot chocolate, for example — something that simply isn’t possible on single-boiler or thermoblock machines. There are trade-offs, of course. It takes a little longer to warm up and draws more power while sitting ready on the countertop. If you’re making several milk-based drinks each day, that extra cost and warm-up time feels justified; if you’re brewing a single espresso occasionally, the balance shifts. In those cases, a machine like the Barista Impress may make more sense.
Sage’s Auto MilQ system introduces presets for both dairy and plant-based milks, including oat, soya and almond. Slightly annoyingly, the results are consistently better than those we can achieve manually after years of practice — and that’s genuinely impressive. Even when switching to manual control, the steam wand itself just feels more capable, injecting texture and heat far more quickly and evenly than the wands on Sage’s other machines.
For those who like to fine-tune, the auto recipes can be overridden. Temperature and foam level are both adjustable, allowing you to dial drinks in precisely to individual preferences. The depth of customisation here is excellent and makes the Oracle Dual Boiler equally suited to households with wildly different coffee tastes.
A cappuccino comes out properly frothy, with drier foam sitting confidently on top, while a flat white — which we half-expected to catch the automation out — has anything but. Instead, you get ultra-smooth, creamy milk that folds beautifully into the espresso for a genuinely satisfying result. Americano drinkers also benefit from a thoughtful design touch, because the hot water spout is positioned directly above the cup and delivers water straight into the glass, almost like magic. Another revelation is dropping premium hot chocolate flakes straight into the milk jug and selecting hot chocolate mode. It’s effortlessly simple, yet the results feel indulgent — a decadently smooth texture, perfectly heated despite the full 220ml volume, with every last flake fully dissolved. In every brew the Oracle Dual Boiler’s promise of speed, convenience and refinement shines through.
Verdict
With the new touchscreen-driven Oracle Dual Boiler, Sage has stepped decisively beyond the Barista Express and Impress class with this model becoming the defining true flagship of the lineup now. It’s closer than ever to a compact café rig for the home, offering simultaneous brewing and steaming, deep automation although still with the option to go fully manual, and a level of consistency that removes almost all of the friction from making great coffee rivalling any fully automatic system.
Crucially, this isn’t about chasing better-tasting espresso than Sage’s already excellent machines are capable of making — it’s about repeatability, speed and confidence. The Oracle Dual Boiler excels at delivering café-quality results day after day, regardless of who’s using it, and does so with an ease that feels almost unfair. From auto-dialled espresso to genuinely impressive milk texturing, it’s a machine that quietly makes you better at coffee without demanding your attention, if that’s how you want to use it.
It isn’t for everyone. It takes up more space, costs more to run and asks you to buy into a touchscreen-first way of working. But if you’re making multiple milk-based drinks daily, value precision over ritual and want the closest thing to a barista workflow without becoming one, the Sage Oracle Dual Boiler is the most complete and capable home espresso machine Sage has ever made.
