Oxford coffee guide: town, gown and four local roasters

Missing Bean and Jericho Coffee Traders both started in 2009, one with a café among the colleges and one with a coffee machine on the back of a Vespa tuk-tuk, and both now roast their own coffee. Colombia Coffee Roasters works only with Colombian producers, and NewGround was set up in 2018 to create work for people leaving prison. Between the four roasters there are cafés in the city centre, the Covered Market, Summertown, East Oxford, Headington and at Osney Mead.

Missing Bean, among the colleges and in East Oxford

Missing Bean opened its first café among the colleges in 2009, and became, by its own account, “Central Oxford’s first independently owned coffee shop”. The founders, Ori Halup and Vicky Troth, both found their way into coffee as students in Sydney; Oxford is Vicky’s home town. The roasting started in 2014 at a roastery in East Oxford, where the Roastery Cafe sits in the same building with a bean refill station and brewers from AeroPress to V60, and a bakery opened behind it in 2023 to supply every café. There are now cafés in Cowley, Botley, Abingdon, Woodstock and Charlbury too. Its oldest direct-trade relationship is with Guillermo Cotrina in Peru’s Chilchos Valley, a 12-hour trek from the nearest road, and the house espresso comes from the Salazar family’s El Calapo farm in Colombia.

Jericho Coffee Traders, the city centre and Osney Mead

Jericho Coffee Traders began in 2009, when James and Lizzie saw a Vespa tuk-tuk for sale at the roadside and thought: “That needs a coffee machine on the back of it!” The trike served Oxford’s farmers’ markets and still works local events. The flagship café is a small room in a historic building in the city centre, with views of University Church and Brasenose College. All the coffee is roasted at Osney Mead, in the Oxford Eco Centre, where a larger café serves cakes and toasties, has a children’s play area and runs a coffee school. Its charity coffees give a share of sales to causes including the Oxford mental-health charity Restore, and in 2026 the student newspaper The Oxford Blue ranked it first of 31 independent coffee shops in the city centre.

Society Café, the city centre

The Oxford branch of Society Café belongs to a family-run group founded in Bath in 2011, now with seven shops in Oxford, Bath, Bristol, Cheltenham and Cardiff. The house coffee is sourced and roasted by Origin in Cornwall, and guest roasters rotate through the shops, more than forty names in all, among them NewGround from Oxford. Milk in Oxford comes from Estate Dairy.

Colombia Coffee Roasters, the Covered Market and Summertown

Colombia Coffee Roasters roasts only Colombian coffee. Milly Barr grew up around a coffee farm in Colombia, came to Britain for a master’s degree in commercial law and gave up a career as a lawyer to start the business, which began as a micro-roastery and café in Oxford’s Covered Market. A second café opened in Summertown in 2019, and the Covered Market café won the Oxford Mail’s Best Café award in 2022, with Summertown second. The green coffee comes directly from Colombian producers, among them Orlando Fierro of Hacienda El Porvenir in Cundinamarca, who is Milly’s uncle. It is roasted on a Loring in Wheatley, east of Oxford, at a roastery open to visitors. The cafés serve an all-day brunch.

NewGround Coffee, Headington and the city centre

NewGround began in 2018 as an impact business, under the line “coffee with conviction”. It exists to create training and jobs for people leaving prison: the NewGround Foundation, a registered charity and the company’s largest shareholder, runs a barista course inside prisons and helps graduates into coffee jobs on release. The coffee is roasted on a Loring at the NewGround Workshop in Headington, a roastery and café where visitors can “see green turn to brown coffee”, and a café and wine bar in the city centre opened in 2023. NewGround has been a certified B Corp since 2022, and its bright orange bags won Coffee Bag Design of the Year at the London Coffee Festival Awards in 2026.

Tree Artisan Cafe

Tree Artisan Cafe was founded in 2020 as a celebration of women in specialty coffee. Every coffee on the menu comes from a woman-led producer or cooperative, bought directly, with multi-year partnerships such as the Maracay farm in Colombia and the Poda women’s farmer groups in North Sumatra; three single origins rotate on the bar. The café is five minutes’ walk from the city centre, among bookshops, vintage stores and independent restaurants, and the baristas brew espresso and pour-over alongside house-baked pastries.

What you need to know about Oxford specialty coffee

Which Oxford coffee shops roast their own coffee? Missing Bean roasts in East Oxford, Jericho Coffee Traders at Osney Mead, NewGround in Headington and Colombia Coffee Roasters in Wheatley. Society Café serves Origin from Cornwall and guest roasters.

Can you visit a roastery? Missing Bean’s Roastery Cafe, Jericho’s roastery café at Osney Mead and the NewGround Workshop all serve coffee in the building where it is roasted. Colombia Coffee Roasters’ roastery in Wheatley is open to visitors.

Where is the coffee in the city centre? Missing Bean’s original café is among the colleges, Jericho’s flagship looks onto University Church, Colombia Coffee Roasters is in the Covered Market, and NewGround and Society Café both have city-centre cafés.

Where can you learn about coffee? Jericho runs a coffee school at its roastery, Colombia Coffee Roasters runs masterclasses in espresso, latte art and filter brewing, and Missing Bean hosts coffee tasting workshops at the Roastery Cafe.