A good travel coffee mug should keep your coffee hot for at least several hours, but that’s the easiest metric to achieve here. Even the non-insulated options I tested are good for about an hour, which may work for a lot of sipping on the go lifestyles. To that end, I started with 160-degree liquid inside each of the models and checked them with a digital thermometer every hour for 6 hours to see how well they kept the heat. (Many brands promise up to 12 hours for hot liquids, but that’s also dependent upon not opening and closing the mug repeatedly to check for temperature.)
Biolsi offered the following insight as a benchmark: “The ideal temperature for coffee depends slightly on personal preference and one’s own ability to handle hot beverages, but generally, a range of 120 to 140 degrees Fahrenheit is recommended,” she says. “This allows you to experience the full complexity of the coffee’s flavor at a drinkable temperature.” While I started a little hotter than that, every model I tested lost at least 10 to 15 degrees of temperature in the first hour, putting it in the ideal temperature range from that point forward.
Beyond that, and arguably more important, a good travel coffee mug should be leak-proof. As a city dweller, I am frequently tossing a travel mug in a handbag of sorts; despite my best attempts to keep a tumbler upright for maximum peace of mind, this isn’t always feasible, and so I’m looking for confidence that hot, stainable liquid isn’t going to be sloshing all over my belongings. Even if you’re putting a travel mug in your cup holder, car commuters require confidence in the sealing mechanism. Scarier things can happen when your coffee malfunctions while driving than walking or sitting on a train. Each travel coffee mug I tested was therefore subjected to a vigorous, upside-down, 10-second shaking, after which I checked for any evidence of a leak in both the closure between the lid and the cup and the sipping aperture. Spoiler alert: Some sprung a leak instantly, others I had to double check that I had actually filled them, so secure were their fittings.
Finally — and this is really where things start to get nuanced — the sipping experience should be a pleasant one. Whether the insulation or lid affects the taste of your coffee, and how gracefully (or not) the liquid transfers from the cup to your mouth. A lot of travel mug testing focuses only on the top two points, and admittedly those were my priorities when I started, but by the end of my own testing experience I was more convinced that so long as you have the top two, which numerous brands do, the real factor comes down to the drinking experience. So I filled each model with homemade French press coffee with milk, as I’d typically drink it, (decaf, since I wasn’t trying to ruin my sleep) and sipped. Those that came out ahead had no transfer of flavor from the vessel itself, and best approximated the feeling of sipping from an actual coffee cup.
For the testing, I chose models from the most trusted, best-selling brands in the insulated drinkware realm, plus a few outliers: those that offer a unique design or element or are new to the travel mug landscape. Most of the major brands offer numerous sizes, colors and styles, including tea infuser options, so whether you’re looking for something small and sleek that can tuck into a bag and be operated one-handed or a mega mug with a handle and a shape that is destined for your cup holder, there’s probably an option to suit you. I’ve specified here what size and model I tested with, but I’d have confidence (or lack thereof) in other options from the same brand, and I’ve listed what they offer below each tested item here.
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