25th Annual World Barista Championship

We’re officially one month out from the 2025 World Barista Championship.

With 54 competitors heading to Milan, Italy, to compete for the honour and title of the 25th World Barista Champion.

The competition schedule was just released this week and we could not be more excited to see this fantastic field of baristas represent their nations on this massive stage. For those that don’t know, the World Barista Championship is the premiere event for the coffee industry - it’s specialty coffee’s Wimbledon Final, it’s the Tour de France Champs-Élysées finish, it’s Sunday at The Masters in that green jacket moment, it’s an Olympic gold-medal round. It’s a stage where lives change, trends and direction come to light and our industry shifts. It’s one of the most important events for specialty coffee. Will you be tuned in?

The context of the championship is the following;

A barista has 15 minutes to present to a panel of four judges. Each of these judges will be served an espresso, a milk beverage and a signature drink (no alcohol is allowed) and the barista will craft an experience that highlights their knowledge of coffee, showcases technical skills and consistency, and usually shares a captivating story that will draw the judges in.

Why do we participate?

It’s an amazing platform to push ourselves personally and professionally. To connect with other industry professionals and share in our passion. To innovate, to push the boundaries and to elevate coffee. In our 15 year journey, we’ve achieved numerous national titles as competitors, and as coaches. We’ve found ourselves in the Finals of 4 World Championships, with back-to-back titles as coaches in 2024 and 2024, and twice landing in the Finals as a competitor. Our journey of coffee business does not exist without our pursuit of the World Barista Championship title

Below are the Top 7 (a situation in 2024 led to the first ever 7 person finals) and three of these talented baristas are returning this year, after achieving back-to-back wins in their respective National Championships.

The Champion becomes a global ambassador for our industry - though the National Champions do too. Take Mikael Jasin as an example, he’s become a global icon in the coffee industry, hosting workshops and sharing sessions around the World, on a mission to ensure that baristas take precautionary steps to avoid burnout, to protect their mental health and to build on their foundations - all part of the personal story he shared, in 2024 when he won the Championship.

Here’s a list of 2025 National Champions

We have just received the first draft of the schedule for the Championship and we’ve put together a list, in order in which they’ll compete in the primary round. You’ll notice there’s some names missing - this is how it currently reads on the schedule, perhaps those nations are not yet decided, or there have been deferrals and World Coffee Events is not sure who is representing just yet.

The next World Barista Champion is on this list.

We’ve taken the time to link to the social media pages for each of the Champions, with the goal of bringing them presence and allowing you to connect and follow any of them, should you be interested 🙂 similar to any sports league out there, the more viewership and connection we bring to the athletes, the more growth and expansion we believe we’ll see within the sport.

Please support these amazing individuals - a simple follow goes a long way.

without further adieu … next up on stage… the Barista Champion rrrrrepresenting…

#1 🇪🇬 Taha Youssef — Egypt

#2 🇲🇾 Jason Loo — Malaysia

#3 🇻🇪 Georgina Montilla — Venezuela

#4 🇵🇱 Daria Figaszewska — Poland

#5 🇻🇳 Bill Nguyen — Vietnam

#6 🇧🇷 Emerson Nascimento — Brazil

#7 🇧🇴 Chris Rodriguez — Bolivia

#8 🇬🇷 Penny Chalkiadaki — Greece

#9 🇩🇪 Anja Fürst — Germany

#10 🇦🇪 Aldy Nugroho — United Arab Emirates

#11 🇳🇴 Erlend Wessel-Berg — Norway

#12 🇮🇩 Aga Muhammad — Indonesia

#13 🇷🇴 Cristi Oltean — Romania

#14 🇨🇴 Edwin Tascon — Colombia

#15 🇦🇷 Cristian Fernández — Guatemala

#16 🇯🇵 Hiroki Ito — Japan

#17 🇸🇪 Patrick Rolf — Sweden

#18 🇺🇦 Anzhelika Rybak — Ukraine

#19 🇨🇭 Christos Sotiros — Switzerland

#20 🇫🇷 Kévin David — France

#21 🇪🇨 Alexis Guayasamin — Ecuador

#22 🇸🇬 Chris Wong Ruoqi — Singapore

#23 🇬🇧 Will Woodhouse-Banks — United Kingdom

#24 🇨🇱 Carlos Medina — Chile

#25 🇭🇰 Gary Au — Hong Kong

#26 🇹🇼 Eric Chang — Taiwan

#27 🇨🇷 Delfina Porras Solís — Costa Rica

#28 🇨🇦 Ben Put — Canada

#29 🇵🇦 Sebastian Hernandez — Panama

#30 🇳🇱 Zjevaun LeMar Janga — Netherlands

#31 🇰🇪 Felix Ouma — Kenya

#32 🇨🇳 Simon SunLei — China

#33 🇵🇪 Jhosseline Benites — Peru

#34 🇮🇹 Daniele Ricci — Italy

#35 🇸🇻 Oscar Zuleta — El Salvador

#36 🇪🇬 Mostafa Mamdouh — Egypt

#37 🇿🇦 Stevo Kühn — South Africa

#38 🇵🇹 [name not shown on schedule] — Portugal

#39 🇦🇹 Dominika Piotrowska — Austria

#40 🇵🇭 Michael Harris — Philippines

#41 🇰🇷 Misun Lim — South Korea

#42 🇮🇪 Ian Kissick — Ireland

#43 🇹🇭 Future Kittipop — Thailand

#44  🇸🇦 [name not shown on schedule] — Saudi Arabia

#45 🇩🇰 Christoper Sahyoun Hoff — Denmark

#46 🇺🇬 Ibrahim Kiganda — Uganda

#47 🇨🇳 Enqi Pan — China

#48 🇦🇺 Jack Simpson — Australia

#49 🇪🇸 Marcos González — Spain

#50 🇲🇽 Jenny Borrego — Mexico

#51 🇮🇳 Suhas Dwarakanath — India

#52 🇳🇿 Yuqi (Max) Cui — Aotearoa/New Zealand

#53 🇨🇿 Jakub Smolka — Czech Republic

#54 🇺🇸 Kay Cheon — United States

Questions for you, the viewer;

We would love to know if there’s a country or an individual that you’re supporting.

Is there a trend or a style of coffee that you believe will make it to the final stage?

Will you attend in person? Will you watch live from a distance?

Are there ways that you believe the competition platform could be improved?

What do these Championships mean to you?

Please feel free to respond to this email and let’s start a dialogue. Alternatively, take to social media and let’s start a more public dialogue there to see if we can bring more spectators into the sport! We’d love to hear your thoughts.

Distance: Buy the Drip run club. Clocking some kilometers. Help us push a few more kilometers through this week?

Want to join us as we hit the road? Let’s connect on Strava! or, join our Whoop group - just respond to the email and let’s grind together!