A working roastery outside St Ives with named single origins and three house blends worth tracking: Halcyon, Pard, and Poderosa. The team advises on grind and brew, which matters when you're buying beans to take home.

Yallah roasts for Cornwall and supplies coffee to hotels and cafes across St Ives. The harbour cafe is where to drink it at source, pour over on the menu.

Harbour-side specialty where the barista weighs doses, purges the grinder between varieties, and knows the sourcing. People travel to St Ives specifically for this.

Origin Coffee of Helston on a La Marzocco, in a tourist town where most cafes have stopped trying. Bags to take home, which is the tell.

Italian owner-barista on the quay, where espresso is the product rather than the backdrop. In a town of food-forward cafes, this is the one for the coffee.

St Ives defaults to tourist-grade coffee. Sea of Coffee is where it's actually worth ordering.

St Ives runs on tourist coffee. This is the independent that survives the comparison; find it once and you have a reliable answer for every trip back.

Origin Coffee pulled properly in a food-led Carbis Bay deli. The coffee isn't why people come, but it's the reason to linger.

Family-run and coffee-focused in a town where passing trade makes it easy not to care. The preparation is careful; the coffee is the reason to return.

A kiosk on the coastal path near the Tate, far enough off the tourist drag that most visitors walk straight past. The locals who've found it call it the best coffee in St Ives.