TL;DR of our AeroPress Go Plus review: The Go Plus is essentially a regular AeroPress that brews directly into an insulated stainless steel tumbler with a sippy lid. The tumbler is the whole pitch, and it’s a decent tumbler — but it’s not leak-proof, and our coffee dropped about 30°F in an hour. The brewer itself is bigger, bulkier, and heavier than both the original AeroPress and the older AeroPress Go. We’d pick the AeroPress Go if you only want one (see more details why).
If your style of travel looks like Airbnbs, offices, in-laws’ kitchens, or hotel rooms with kettles, this is a polished, all-in-one setup. If you’re more likely to travel by backpacking or minimizing weight and volume, it’s the wrong tool. And if you already own a regular AeroPress and a decent mug, you don’t gain much.
This is not an evolution of the AeroPress. It’s a different behavior product disguised as one.
So, true confession: when the Go Plus showed up in our kitchen, I was prepared to be a little smug about it. The original AeroPress is one of the most beloved bits of coffee gear ever made (we have a whole AeroPress recipe write-up, naturally), and the AeroPress Go was a near-perfect adaptation for travel. Why mess with a good thing?
The answer, I now think, is: because there’s a real, specific person this thing is built for, and once you see them, the design makes a lot of sense. It’s just probably not the same person who already owns and loves a regular AeroPress.
Let’s get into it.
What the AeroPress Go Plus Actually Is
If you’ve never used an AeroPress: it’s an immersion brewer that uses gentle air pressure to push hot water through coffee grounds and a paper filter. The result is a clean, full-bodied cup somewhere between a French Press and a really good drip coffee. People love it because it’s fast, forgiving, and produces consistently great coffee with cheap, indestructible plastic parts.
The Go Plus keeps that brewing system completely intact. The chamber, the plunger, the rubber seal, the paper filters — all the AeroPress stuff you expect, all working the same way. The big idea here is that everything packs down inside an insulated stainless steel travel tumbler, and you brew directly into that tumbler with the included sippy lid.
So you get the brewer plus the cup plus the storage container, all in one. No carafe, no separate mug, no juggling. It comes in black, white, or pink, and the brewer itself is clear in color. I personally really like the look.
What’s in the Box
Pulling the Go Plus out of the box, here’s what you get:
The black insulated stainless tumbler with a sippy-style lid. The AeroPress chamber and plunger, sized to nest inside the tumbler when you’re not brewing. A travel scoop and stirrer. A small pack of paper micro-filters. A filter cap that holds the paper filter in place during the press.
Everything fits inside the tumbler when packed up, which is the “Complete Travel System” pitch they make on the box. And to AeroPress’s credit, it really does all fit. Tetris-style, but it fits.
Aeropress Go Plus vs. Original
Read our full guide on the AeroPress Original vs. Go vs. Go Plus »
If you already own and love a classic AeroPress, here’s the quick read: the Go Plus is a different product, not an upgrade.
The original:
- cheaper
- lighter
- more flexible (works with most mugs)
- better for home use
The Go Plus:
- heavier
- more constrained
- dependent on its own ecosystem
- better only when portability + drinking vessel integration is the priority
The original AeroPress is dirt cheap, light, and has a huge enthusiast community throwing recipes at it. It brews into whatever cup or carafe you already own. It’s a tool. It assumes you have a kitchen.
The Go Plus, by contrast, is a system. The brewer itself is noticeably bigger, bulkier, and heavier than the regular AeroPress — partly because it’s sized to nest with the tumbler, and partly because, well, it now comes with a tumbler. The whole package weighs more than just an AeroPress and a mug from your cabinet ever would.
That extra bulk is the trade. You’re paying for the tumbler, and the tumbler is the point.
If you brew at home every morning, and you already own mugs, I’d argue you do not need a Go Plus. Buy a regular AeroPress and a nice double walled glass mug and you’re done.
The Go Plus only earns its keep when you’re leaving the house.
How the Go Plus Compares to the AeroPress Go
This is the comparison I was most interested in, because the AeroPress Go is already a great travel solution. It’s a smaller, more compact version of the regular AeroPress that packs into a little plastic mug. It’s even billed as the extra small AeroPress. (Read our full AeroPress Go review »)
Two things stand out:
- The original Go is more compact. Hands down. The Go is genuinely small. It feels like something you’d throw in a daypack without thinking about it. The Go Plus is bigger and heavier. If sheer “smallest possible footprint” is what you want from a travel coffee setup, the original Go still wins.
- The Go Plus is a much nicer drinking experience. The little plastic Go mug works, but it’s a plastic mug. It’s functional but clearly utilitarian. The Go Plus tumbler is insulated steel, more of a fit to drink out of all morning at a desk, in the car, on a flight, wherever. It just feels like a real cup.
So the question becomes: Are you traveling to a place where you’ll want to drink out of a real, insulated, lidded mug? Or are you just trying to make coffee at a campsite and pour it into something else?
If you’re hiking in and minimizing every gram, the original Go is still your friend. Otherwise the Go Plus could be a fit.
The Tumbler Is the Whole Pitch (and It’s Not Perfect)
Since the tumbler is doing all the heavy lifting on the value prop here, it’s worth being honest about how it actually performs.
It’s not leak-proof
This is the one I want to flag the loudest. The lid is a sippy-style lid with a flip-up tab — fine for sipping, fine for sitting on your desk. But it is not leak-proof. If you toss this in a bag with full coffee and it tips over, you’re going to have a bad time and a wet laptop.
For a product whose whole identity is “travel,” this is a bigger gap than I’d expect. I’d love to see a future version with a real screw-down sealing lid as an option, even if you had to swap lids before walking out the door. As is, treat it like an open mug with a splash guard, not a thermos.
The thermal performance isn’t terrible
I ran a casual test, the way an actual person uses a tumbler. Brewed coffee into the Go Plus tumbler, put the lid on, set it on the counter, and checked the temperature an hour later. It dropped about 30°F in that hour. This is much less than a similar test I ran with our Owala coffee tumblers, which dropped about 70 degrees in the same amount of time.
That said, in a good vacuum-insulated mug, a hot drink will stay hot for about an hour with only a modest drop in temperature, so there are certainly better mugs to keep coffee hot on the market.
A nice double-walled stainless tumbler from a brand that specializes in this stuff (a Yeti, a Stanley, a Hydro Flask, a Klean Kanteen) will hold temperature dramatically better than that.
Compared to a ceramic mug, sure, the Go Plus does better. Compared to what most people picture when they hear “insulated steel tumbler,” it underdelivers.
» Learn more: The best coffee mugs to keep coffee hot we’ve found
Part of what’s probably going on is that the lid isn’t a full seal, so heat is escaping more freely than it would from a sealed thermos. Which loops back to the leak-proof issue — the design choices are connected.
That said, it’s a nice tumbler to drink from
Don’t let the gripes overshadow the basics: it feels good in the hand and it looks sharp. I find the matte black genuinely handsome. The opening is wide enough to actually clean.
The lid lets the coffee’s aroma through when you sip, which I appreciate. As a regular sipping mug, it’s a perfectly nice object.
A plus: It solves a common compatibility problem
Many AeroPress setups don’t fit well into insulated tumblers people already own. You either brew separately and pour (extra dish, extra step), or struggle to position the AeroPress on narrow mug openings.
The Go Plus eliminates that friction by designing the brewer around its own cup geometry. It just works without awkward balancing or transfers.
How to Brew with the AeroPress Go Plus
The brew experience is essentially the AeroPress experience, which is to say: easy, fast, and kind of fun. You put the filter in the cap, screw the cap on, drop in your scoop of coffee, pour in hot water, stir, plunge. Two minutes, give or take.
Brewing directly into the tumbler is satisfying. It’s nice to not have to dirty a separate carafe and then pour into a mug. One less thing to wash, one less coffee-stained surface in your day.
Cleanup is the same as a regular AeroPress, which is to say: very easy. Pop the puck of spent grounds into the trash, rinse the chamber and the cap, and you’re done.
Cost Considerations
An important question isn’t just “is it worth it?” but:
Are you paying for better coffee, or for integration?
Because the Go Plus doesn’t meaningfully improve brew quality over a standard AeroPress. What you’re paying for is:
- a stainless steel insulated tumbler
- a bundled storage system
- and a travel-oriented packaging design
Those differences add up, but it’s not equivalent to performance improvement.
In practice, the value equation looks like this:
- Regular AeroPress: low cost, high flexibility, best home ROI (~$35)
- AeroPress Go: moderate cost, true portability, lowest weight system (~$40)
- Go Plus: highest cost, best “contained experience,” weakest efficiency per dollar (~$70)
And that last point is the uncomfortable one: you are paying more to get less efficiency in insulation, less portability than the Go, and no meaningful upgrade in coffee quality.
The only real gain is convenience in specific travel scenarios where consolidation matters more than optimization.
If you zoom out, this is not a value play but a preference play.
Who the Go Plus Is Actually For
After living with this thing for a bit, I think the ideal Go Plus owner is pretty specific:
You travel for work and stay in places that have a kettle or a way to boil water. You want good coffee in the morning without going to find a cafe, and you don’t want to drink hotel-room drip. You want to make it, drink it, and pack it up in one motion without scattering gear across a counter you don’t own.
Or: you go to an office, and the office coffee is sad, and you want to bring your own brewing setup and your own cup in one tidy package.
Or: you’re a one-bag traveler with a kitchenette, and you want one object that does coffee and is also your daily cup.
Who it’s NOT for:
- Backpackers: If you’re measuring your coffee setup in grams and ounces because you’re carrying it on your back for ten miles, the Go Plus is too much. The tumbler is steel, the brewer is bigger than the original Go, and the whole package is heavier than what an ultralight crowd will tolerate. Get an original AeroPress Go, or honestly, an even lighter immersion option.
- People who already have a simple, working home AeroPress routine: It’s also probably not for you if you’re a happy regular-AeroPress owner who just brews at home. You don’t need this. Your kitchen mug is fine.
Is the AeroPress Go Plus Worth It?
If you fit the “traveling to a kitchen” profile above — yeah, this is a really nice piece of gear. The all-in-one packing is genuinely convenient, the tumbler is pleasant to drink from, and the AeroPress brewing experience is as good as it ever was.
If you’re hoping it’s going to replace your regular AeroPress at home, it won’t. It’s bigger and the tumbler is unnecessary at home. And if you’re hoping it’s a true ultralight travel solution, it’s not that either. The original AeroPress Go is still smaller and lighter, and a sealed thermos will hold heat better.
The Go Plus lives in a real and useful middle space — it’s the AeroPress for people whose travel involves countertops and outlets, not trail miles. If that’s you, you’re going to like it. If it’s not, you have better options at both ends.
