Your coffee habit (or addiction) is costing you a lot of money. A cup of Starbucks latte costs around $3.50 in Singapore, which means a daily coffee consumption can cost around S$1,300 for a year! Here's how you can go easy on your wallet.

how to save money on coffee in singapore

Buy a coffee maker that meets your budget

While Nespresso — the go-to brand for coffee machines — has machines that retail above $500, not all of them are as pricey. Their cheapest machine, the Essenza Mini, costs $168. At a discount, other machines can meet the same price tag, too. Check out their page to see which is right for you. Chinese brand Xiaomi also has a coffee machine that cost even less at around $150. You can also check out local brand Medano (they have a cafe in Courts Megastore Tampines) which retails their machine at $168. Best of all, a lot of these are espresso compatible, meaning you can still enjoy all of your favorite Nespresso flavours regardless of the machine.

Use reusable capsules

While a lot of companies have created flexibility for coffee lovers by creating Nespresso-compatible coffee machines, some others have furthered this trend by creating Nespresso compatible reusable capsules. Costing as little as $1 each, these capsules can allow coffee drinkers to fill up their own capsules with whichever coffee bean they want. Simply purchase coffee beans of your choice and fill them in these capsules. It is extremely cost efficient and environmentally friendly.

A capsule requires about two to three grams of coffee for each brew. If the average price of coffee beans cost about 75 cents per gram, you can brew a cup of coffee for only about 15 to 23 cents. If you drink 1 cup of coffee per day, this is a cost reduction of roughly 70 per cent from Nespresso capsules, which cost 70 to 90 cents each.

reusable coffee capsules to save money on coffee in singapore

Pay for your coffee addiction with coffee-friendly cards

Even if you still plan to purchase and drink coffee from shops and cafes, it will still makes financial sense to get a coffee machine at home if you drink coffee at least once a day: given that a cup of coffee can cost about $3.00 to $5.00, it only takes about 40-50 cups of coffees that you make at home to break even on your coffee machine.

Even better, earning credit card rewards on your coffee machine, capsule and ground coffee bean purchases can help improve this calculation even more. Even for those who still need to buy coffee outside when meeting friends and colleagues, there are many cashback credit cards in Singapore that often come with special discount deals with coffee chains. Of note, Citi SMRT Card provides a 5% rebate at various chains like Starbucks, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, Toastbox and Coffee Club.

Good luck and happy cuppa!

This article was first published on Value Champion.