The World Atlas Of Coffee

Most coffee writing starts in the cup and works backwards, describing a flavour without ever explaining the farm, the variety or the processing that put it there. This book runs the other direction.

The World Atlas of Coffee is organised by producing country rather than by brewing method, covering more than 35 origins across 288 pages, from Bolivia to Zambia. Each chapter walks through a region's varieties, how the cherries are harvested and processed, and how those decisions surface in the drink. Colour illustrations map terroir and processing method by region throughout. They do real work, rather than sitting as decoration around the text. James Hoffmann, the Sunday Times bestselling author of How to Make the Best Coffee at Home, has sold 400,000 copies across the first two editions.

This third edition, published by Mitchell Beazley in October 2025, is where the structure shifted most. Two new chapters cover decaffeination and steep-and-release brewers, a fair reflection of where home equipment has gone since the second edition. The origins list grows too. It now takes in Australia, Japan and Puerto Rico, three countries that rarely get space in coffee writing at all.

The format tells you how it expects to be used. At 20.6 by 26.2 centimetres in hardcover, it is built to lie open on a counter through a slow pour rather than to be read front to back in an evening.