Philips 5500 vs De’Longhi Rivelia: best mid-range super-automatic?

Philips 5500 vs De’Longhi Rivelia at a glance

Head to head

The better result in each row is marked, based on my testing and the manufacturer specs. Rows where they are equal have no winner.

The tally is not my verdict. Coffee drinkers and latte drinkers will weigh these rows very differently.

Design, size and build

Both are narrow machines designed for real kitchens rather than showrooms. The way you reach their parts is the biggest physical difference.

The Philips 5500 is listed at about 9.7 x 14.6 x 17 inches and weighs around 17.6 pounds. At under 25 centimeters wide, it slid into a gap that most bean-to-cup machines wouldn’t fit.

Its water tank, grounds container and drip tray all slide out from the front. Under low cabinets, that means you never move the machine.

The De’Longhi Rivelia measures about 9.6 x 16.9 x 15.2 inches, close to 10 inches wide with its side tank fitted, and weighs about 21 pounds. Its tank lifts out from the side, and its touchscreen sits flat on top.

Depth on the counter

Both fit a standard 24-inch-deep counter with room for the drip tray.

The Philips 5500 loads everything from the front, so it can stay under cabinets.

Both are mostly plastic with a solid feel. Neither rattled or flexed over the month, and both drip trays slid smoothly in and out.

The Rivelia’s top-mounted screen was the one design choice I didn’t love. My kids couldn’t see it, and I had to stand over the machine to read it.

Our tip: Measure the space under your cabinets before buying the Rivelia, because you need room above it to read the top screen and lift the hoppers.

Setup and the first week

Setup took about 15 minutes on each: rinse the tank, fit the water filter, set the hardness with the test strip and let the machine prime.

The Philips is built around a thermoblock✕ThermoblockA compact heater that warms water as it flows through a metal block, instead of keeping a whole boiler hot. It heats up fast., so it skips a slow warm-up and was ready to brew within about 20 to 25 seconds of switching on.

The Rivelia was quick too. On day one, I ran Bean Adapt for my medium roast, and it suggested a grind in the middle of the range.

The first drinks on both were a little flat. The Philips needed about a dozen drinks for its brew group to bed in, which its own guidance mentions, and the Rivelia settled after a few.

Setup on both took about 15 minutes, with a test strip and a water filter.

Our tip: Don’t judge the Philips on its first few drinks, because its brew group needs about a dozen cycles to bed in and early shots taste flat.

Screen, menus and profiles

Both save drinks for four people, and both make that easy. The difference is the number of recipes and where you look.

The Philips 5500 has 20 recipes, covering black coffees, milk drinks, hot water and a full iced menu. The display faces you on the front panel.

The De’Longhi Rivelia offers 18 one-touch recipes in the US version, from espresso and coffee to flat white✕Flat whiteA short milk coffee with a double shot and a thin layer of silky microfoam. Stronger and less foamy than a cappuccino., cortado✕CortadoA small drink of espresso cut with roughly the same amount of warm milk, with very little foam., cappuccino and latte macchiato. Its 3.5-inch color touchscreen is sharp, bright and responsive.

Rivelia’s Bean Adapt asks a few questions about your beans and suggests a grind, then sets dose and temperature. Instead of guessing at 13 settings, you start somewhere sensible and adjust by taste.

The Rivelia’s touchscreen is clear, but it sits flat on the top panel.

Our tip: Set up all four profiles on day one on either machine, because shared drinks get changed by accident and nobody remembers the old settings.

Grinder and dose

This is the difference you’ll taste every day. The Rivelia simply uses more coffee.

The De’Longhi Rivelia has a 44 mm brew chamber that holds up to about 15 grams. At intensity 5, the grinder ran about 10 seconds and produced roughly 15 grams on my scale.

The Philips 5500 uses flat ceramic burrs✕Ceramic burrsGrinding parts made of hard ceramic. They wear slowly and stay cool, which helps protect the coffee’s aroma. with 12 grind settings, adjusted by a dial inside the hopper. Its espresso tasted noticeably lighter, which points to a smaller dose✕DoseThe weight of ground coffee used for one drink. A bigger dose gives a stronger, fuller cup..

I measured that lightness directly. My Philips espresso shots read between 4.5 and 5.5 percent TDS✕TDS (total dissolved solids)The share of the drink that is dissolved coffee. Espresso usually lands somewhere around 8 to 12 percent., against the 8 to 12 percent a typical portafilter espresso lands in.

Espresso strength I measured (TDS)

Measured with a refractometer. The Rivelia tasted clearly fuller with its 15 g dose.

The Rivelia grinds about 15 g at intensity 5 for a fuller shot.

Our tip: Brew a double espresso and add hot water on the Philips for a big black coffee, because its longest coffee setting tastes thin and flat.

Espresso quality

With the same medium roast, the Rivelia made the better espresso. The Philips made a smooth, balanced cup that just isn’t as concentrated.

My Rivelia recipe was intensity 5 with a small cup, aiming for roughly a 1:2 brew ratio✕Brew ratioThe weight of dry coffee compared with the weight of liquid espresso. 1:2 means 18 g of coffee makes 36 g of espresso., about 30 grams of espresso from 15 grams of coffee. It came out round and sweet with good crema✕CremaThe golden, foamy layer on top of a fresh espresso. It forms when pressure pushes oils and gases out of the coffee..

The Philips espresso was easy to drink and pleasant, but lighter than a café pull. On its hottest setting, it reached about 80°C, or 176°F, at the spout.

I also ran a quick blind test with two daily coffee drinkers. Both picked the Rivelia’s espresso straight away, and one still picked it in a cappuccino.

The Philips 5500 makes smooth, easy espresso that is lighter than a café shot.

My espresso ratings

Scores out of 10 for body, crema, flavor and consistency.

If you drink espresso straight, the gap is obvious. In a latte with 8 ounces of milk, it narrows, but the Rivelia’s drinks still tasted more like coffee.

Milk drinks

Milk drinks are where the Philips earns its place in the kitchen. It’s the easier and faster machine for a latte household.

The Philips 5500 uses a two-part milk carafe. Milk came out at about 75°C, or 167°F, which is hot without tasting scalded.

Cleaning is the headline. The carafe came apart in two pieces, rinsed clean under the tap in about 10 seconds and went straight back on the machine; both pieces are dishwasher safe for a deeper wash.

The De’Longhi Rivelia draws milk from its carafe and builds the drink in the cup. Milk consistently came out between 140 and 149°F, right where milk tastes sweetest, and its foam was a touch finer.

I foamed whole, 2% and barista oat milk on both. Whole milk was sweetest on both machines; oat held up better on the Rivelia, where the cooler temperature kept it from thinning out.

For very hot drinks, the Philips wins. If you like your latte so hot you have to wait before sipping, its 167°F milk will suit you better.

The Rivelia’s foam was slightly finer; the Philips’ milk was hotter.

Milk temperature I measured

Research from the University of Camerino found foam is most stable around 60°C, or 140°F.

The Philips carafe holds 260 milliliters, enough for one or two drinks. Its spout is fixed, so cup placement matters: push the cup too far back and the milk catches the rim.

Iced coffee

The Philips has a full iced menu, which makes it the better machine for summer. There’s a catch, though.

It doesn’t use cold extraction. Instead, it lowers its brewing temperature to about 60°C, or 140°F, compared with about 80°C for hot espresso, and pours over ice.

That works well for a quick iced latte, but some strength is lost to melting ice. A full glass of ice helps, because more ice melts more slowly.

The Rivelia has iced recipes too, brewing hot coffee over ice. Neither makes true cold brew✕Cold brewCoffee made with cool water instead of hot. It tastes smoother and less acidic than coffee brewed hot. or cold foam.

The Philips iced menu brews cooler coffee over ice, with some dilution.

Our tip: Fill the glass to the top with ice for iced drinks on either machine, because a few cubes melt fast and water the coffee down.

Bean switching and decaf

This is the Rivelia’s headline feature, and the Philips has no answer to it.

The Bean Switch✕Bean Switch SystemDe’Longhi’s pair of swappable bean hoppers. You twist one off and the other on to change beans in seconds. system uses two 8.8-ounce hoppers that lock on with a 90-degree twist. Swapping took about three seconds.

About 10 grams of beans stay in the grinder after a swap. Choose grind and empty rather than a transition drink when you switch to decaf, or your afternoon cup still has caffeine.

On the Philips, decaf means pre-ground coffee or emptying the hopper. Both work, but neither is as easy.

Coffee lost per bean change

About two-thirds of a single shot per switch on the Rivelia.

The Rivelia’s second hopper makes regular and decaf genuinely easy.

Our tip: Pair beans with similar roast levels in the Rivelia’s two hoppers, because a light and a dark roast won’t both taste right on the same grind setting.

Cleaning and upkeep

Both rinse on startup, drop pucks into a drawer and remind you to empty it. The milk side is where they differ.

The Philips’ two-part carafe is the fastest milk clean I know. The Rivelia runs a carafe clean cycle you confirm on screen, and the carafe needs a fuller wash regularly.

Both brew unit✕Brew unitThe part of an automatic machine that compresses the ground coffee, holds it while water passes through and ejects the used puck.s come out for rinsing. I rinsed the Philips every two weeks and the Rivelia weekly.

My daily hands-on cleaning time

My estimate of hands-on time per day, not counting automatic rinses.

Two parts and about 10 seconds under the tap: the Philips milk clean is the easiest I know.

Our tip: Rinse the Philips carafe straight after use, because milk residue dries and sours if you leave it until the evening.

Noise

Noise is one area where the Philips 5500 genuinely surprised me. With the bean lid closed, its grinding measured around 60 dB.

The Rivelia measured between 66 and 68 dB during grinding and brewing. That is quiet for its class, but clearly louder than the Philips.

Noise I measured

Decibels are logarithmic, so 6 to 8 dB is a clearly audible difference.

In an open-plan apartment at 6 a.m., the Philips is the better neighbor. Keep its bean lid closed, because it makes a real difference.

The difference is partly the grinder and partly the brew group. The Philips’ ceramic burrs turn with a low hum, and its brew group moves with a soft click rather than a clunk.

The Rivelia’s grinder runs for only about 10 seconds per drink, so the louder part is short. If you make one drink at a time, the gap feels smaller than the numbers suggest; for four drinks in a row, it adds up.

Our tip: Close the Philips bean lid before you brew, because it keeps grinding noise down to around 60 dB in my measurements.

Water, beans and supplies

The Philips’ 1.8-liter tank is the bigger of the two and slides out from the front. The Rivelia’s 47-ounce tank needed refilling more often.

Because the Rivelia uses more coffee per drink, a bag of beans goes faster. That’s the price of its fuller flavor.

The Rivelia uses more coffee per drink, and you can taste it.

Our tip: Choose medium, dry-looking beans for the Philips, because oily dark roasts clump in its hopper and make the grinder struggle.

A morning with each

I timed real mornings for a household of three: a cappuccino, a latte and an espresso.

On the Philips, I switched on, clipped on the carafe and made the three drinks back to back. Then I rinsed the two carafe parts under the tap and put the milk back in the fridge.

On the Rivelia, I picked each profile, made the three drinks and ran the carafe clean. On a decaf afternoon, I swapped hoppers in about three seconds.

Hands-on time, three-drink morning

Time I spent at the machine, not counting brewing.

The totals are close. The Philips saves you a few seconds of cleanup every day, and the Rivelia gives you better coffee for them.

Mornings took about the same time on both; the difference was in the cup.

How four weeks went

Here is how my view of each machine changed over the month.

By the end, the split was clear. Latte drinkers in my house preferred the Philips for its hot milk and easy clean. I preferred the Rivelia every time I drank espresso or a flat white.

After a month, the Philips was the machine my latte-drinking household reached for.

Mistakes to avoid on each

Both machines are easy to live with, but each has a few habits that hold it back. These were the ones I hit during my test.

On the Philips, the long coffee setting was the trap. It tasted thin and flat, while a double espresso topped up with hot water made a much better mug.

On the Rivelia, the decaf transition drink is the one to watch. It mixes about 10 grams of leftover regular beans into your cup, so your “decaf” still has caffeine.

Choose grind and empty when switching the Rivelia to decaf.

Our tip: Fit the water filter and descale on time on both machines, because hard tap water builds scale faster than you’d expect.

Real-life scenarios

Specs only go so far. These are the situations where one machine clearly pulled ahead during my testing.

For latte-heavy households, the Philips 5500 was the easiest machine to live with.

My scorecard

These are my own scores out of 10 after four weeks with each machine. I added drink range and household features because they decide this matchup.

Philips 5500

De’Longhi Rivelia

Overall, I rate both about 8.7 in this matchup, for very different reasons. The Rivelia makes the better coffee and handles decaf; the Philips makes milk drinks easier, quieter and cleaner.

Which one should you buy?

It comes down to one question: is your house about coffee or about milk? Answer that honestly and the choice makes itself.

Think about who drinks what, too. A house of latte drinkers with one espresso fan will be happier with the Philips; a house of coffee lovers who share milk drinks will be happier with the Rivelia. For the wider picture beyond this matchup, see my guide to the best Philips espresso machines.

If you want the strongest new super-automatic, see my Ninja AutoBarista vs Rivelia comparison. For a cheaper Philips, read my Philips 3300 vs 5500 head-to-head or the full Philips 5500 review.

For coffee-first households, the Rivelia’s bigger dose makes the difference.

Philips 5500 vs De’Longhi Rivelia specifications

From manufacturer specifications and my own testing.

How I tested and compared them

I used each machine as my everyday coffee maker for four weeks, making espresso, americanos, cappuccinos, lattes, flat whites and iced drinks.

I weighed doses and shots, measured espresso strength with a refractometer, probed milk and coffee temperatures, logged noise with a meter and timed cleaning and hopper swaps.

I compared my notes with Philips and De’Longhi specifications, owner documentation and published coffee research.

• Coffee: dose, TDS, crema and body.
• Milk: foam texture, temperature and cleanup.
• Workflow: profiles, recipes, iced drinks and bean switching.
• Ownership: noise, cleaning, water care and footprint.