Nespresso Inissia vs Pixie

Do you love how classy and beautiful the Nespresso espresso machines look? Well, today we’ll be talking about two very popular machines from Nespresso—the Inissia and the Pixie. These two machines have a lot in common, but there are some differences between them that make one of the machines better than the other. Nevertheless, both of them are great and affordable espresso machines.

Summary

Our pick: Nespresso Pixie

Both the Inissia and the Pixie are good espresso machines, but the Pixie is more durable and convenient. The Inissia doesn’t offer an innovative design that could make it top the Pixie. The only advantage that this machine has over the Pixie is its affordable price. However, the Pixie saves you money in the long run since it works with both Nespresso and third-party capsules.

About Nespresso Inissia

The Inssia is designed to look modern and smooth, but to also be very compact. The machine comes in multiple different colors, is mostly made of plastic, and features a removable 24-ounce water tank on the back and a capsule chamber on the front. To put your capsules in the machine, you need to use the handle that’s attached to the machine.

The Nespresso Inissia works with Nespresso capsules only. Once the machine is done brewing the capsule, you need to use its handle once again to push the capsule inside the capsule compartment. The compartment of the Inissia can hold up to 10 spent capsules.

Brewing espressos is easy for the Inissia since the machine uses a 19-bar pressure pump to do that. Just put a smaller cup under the machine for an espresso or a bigger one for lungo and press on one of the two buttons on the Inissia to get your drink. If your coffee cup doesn’t fit underneath the Inissia, you can fold its tray so you have more space for the cup.

If you want to program the amount of water in your drinks on the Inissia, you can do that by pressing and holding on either the espresso or the lungo button. This machine takes 25 seconds to heat up before it brews your coffee drink. Once it’s done brewing, it will automatically shut down if it’s inactive for more than nine minutes.

About Nespresso Pixie

The Nespresso Pixie by Breville is one of the few machines that made it on our best espresso machine under $300 list. That said, it’s only fair of you to expect the Pixie to be an affordable machine with character.

If you are into espresso machines that look classy and industrial, you might like the design of the Pixie. The Pixie has a housing that is made of metal for the most part which makes it very durable. It also is very compact and you can get it in the color that you most prefer.

You can power on the Pixie by pressing the power button on the back of the machine. Then, you can make yourself a nice espresso or a lungo and choose how much water you want in your drink. You can program the amount of water by pressing and holding the button for the drink that you want.

There’s a 19-bar pressure pump inside the Pixie that helps the machine brew espresso. The water for the espresso on the Pixie comes from its 24-ounce water tank. The machine will brew you your coffee and it will automatically shut down if you don’t use it for more than nine minutes afterward, which is how the machine saves on energy.

The Nespresso Pixie works with both Nespresso and third-party capsules and it has a capsule compartment with a capacity of up to 10 used capsules. The machine also has a foldable cup tray, and it can accommodate taller cups. This machine also uses LED lights to let you know when the water tank needs to be refilled.

The Nespresso Pixie costs more than the Nespresso Inissia.

Similarities between the Nespresso Inissia and the Nespresso Pixie

The Pixie and the Inissia are similar espresso machines. They are both single-serve and capsule-based, they both come in different colors, and their designs are only slightly different. Furthermore, both the Pixie and the Inissia are easy to use and make coffee drinks with similar quality.

Both of the machines have a 19-bar pressure pump for brewing espresso and a 24-ounce water reservoir. They both work with Nespresso Grand Crus to make you espresso and lungo. The amount of water in the espresso and the lungo is programmable on both of the machines.

You can use both smaller and taller cups on both of these machines because their drip trays are foldable. The capacity of the capsule compartments on both the Pixie and the Inissia is the same, and they can both store up to 10 used capsules. Furthermore, the two machines both automatically turn off after they haven’t been brewing for more than nine minutes.

Differences between the Nespresso Inissia and the Nespresso Pixie

There are slight differences between the Inissia and the Pixie that will help you choose which Nespresso to buy easily.

The machines have a slightly different look. The Inissia looks smoother and is mostly made of plastic, while the Pixie is made of aluminum for the most part and it looks more industrial. Having a housing made of aluminum, the Pixie is more durable than the Inissia.

Furthermore, the stainless steel grill on the drip tray also makes the tray less prone to different kinds of damage. The two machines have slightly different lids on their reservoirs as well. The lid on the Inissia is narrower than the lid on the Pixie. Even though both of the lids are made of plastic, this difference in narrowness makes the lid on the Pixie look slightly more durable.

There’s also a slight difference in their dimensions and weights which makes the Inissia slightly more compact and lightweight than the Pixie. The Inissia measures 4.7 x 9 x 12.6 inches and weighs 5.3 pounds, and the Pixie measures 4.4 x 9.3 x 12.8 inches and weighs 7 pounds. The difference in dimensions is, however, very small.

Another difference between the two machines is that the Pixie comes with a power button, unlike the Inissia that turns on at the push of the espresso or the lungo button on its top. The Pixie also uses LED lights that shine around the sides of the machine to tell you when it’s time to refill its water tank. This is a cool feature that can remind you to refill the tank so that your machine is instantly ready to brew the next time you want a cup of espresso or lungo. The Inissia, unfortunately, doesn’t have this feature.

One of the biggest differences between the two machines is that the Pixie can work with third-party capsules while the Inissia only works with Nespresso Grand Crus. This makes the Pixie more convenient than the Inissia since it’s easier to find capsules that the machine works with. Of course, this also gives you the opportunity to enjoy more coffee flavors with the Pixie than you can enjoy with the Inissia.

Finally, the Pixie is more expensive than the Inissia. However, when taken into consideration that many third-party capsules are cheaper than Nespresso’s Grand Crus, the Pixie could be the cheaper alternative in the long run.

Which one should you go with?

In our opinion, the Pixie is the better option between these two machines. It brews nice espresso and lungo, it is more convenient, it is easy to use, it is compact, and it has all these little bells and whistles that you can’t find on the Inissia. However, if you feel like you would like to start with a cheaper machine that is, for the most part, very similar to the Pixie, the Inissia is worth buying as well.

TO find more about how the Pixie compares to the CitiZ and to the VertuoLine, read our Pixie vs CitiZ and Pixie vs Vertuoline articles.