Short answer
Choose the Dolce Gusto Genio S Plus if you want cold and iced drinks as well as hot ones: De’Longhi says it makes both. Choose the Tassimo Style Friendly if your household drinks tea, hot chocolate and milky coffees: Bosch lists all of them, each disc’s barcode sets the drink, and the descaling steps are written down. For most mixed households the Tassimo is the safer buy, mainly because far more about it is published. Neither froths fresh milk.
Dolce Gusto or Tassimo is a long-running question for UK households where one person wants a latte, another a cup of tea and the children a hot chocolate. Both systems use their own pods, neither of these machines froths fresh milk, and both sets of pods go in the same Podback bag. What separates them is which drinks each maker lists, how each machine sets a drink, and how much each maker tells you about looking after it. We compared the Nescafé Dolce Gusto Genio S Plus, the Dolce Gusto machine we track, with the Tassimo by Bosch Style Friendly, the current compact Tassimo. Both are in our comparison of every pod machine we track.
One caution: much less is published about the Genio S Plus. De’Longhi’s UK page gives its pump, weight, controls and warranty, but not its tank, size or drinks, and we couldn’t read its manual. Where we don’t know, we say so.
Hot drinks listed
Not listed on De'Longhi's UK page
Tea, hot chocolate, lattes and coffee
Cold drinks
Hot and cold drinks, De'Longhi says
Sold as a hot drinks machine
Milk drinks Tie
No frother or steam wand
No frother; milk drinks come from discs
Controls
Buttons; on when you open the clamp
Barcode sets each drink; no warm-up
Descaling
No instructions we could read
Two tablets, about 30 minutes
Size and tank Tie
About 2.1 kg; tank and size not published
0.7 L tank, 26.5 cm tall, 1.9 kg
Recycling Tie
Podback green bag
Podback green bag
Choose the Nescafé Dolce Gusto Genio S Plus if you want cold and iced drinks as well as hot, and already know the Dolce Gusto capsule range suits you.
Choose the Tassimo by Bosch Style Friendly if your household wants tea, hot chocolate and milky coffees at one button, with upkeep you can read up on first.
Hot drinks and pods
Bosch lists caffè crema, coffee, espresso, cappuccino, latte macchiato, hot milk, hot chocolate and tea among the Tassimo’s drinks, from brands such as L’OR, Kenco and Costa, and puts the range at up to 50 drinks. Every one comes from a T DISC, and the machine takes original Tassimo discs only. The Genio S Plus takes Nescafé Dolce Gusto capsules only, and De’Longhi’s UK page doesn’t say which drinks they cover; Nescafé Dolce Gusto’s own UK site refuses our requests, so we can’t confirm today’s range from an official page. On what we could check, the Tassimo wins, and it’s the pick if tea and hot chocolate matter as much as coffee.
Cold drinks
Here the Genio S Plus wins. De’Longhi says it makes cold drinks as well as hot ones and lists that among its main features. Bosch sells the Style Friendly as a hot drinks machine, and nothing cold appears in its drinks list. If iced coffee in summer is part of the appeal, that settles it in the Genio’s favour. We can’t tell you which cold capsules are on sale now, so check the range at the shop before you buy.
Milk drinks
Neither machine froths fresh milk: neither has a frother or steam wand. Milky drinks on the Tassimo come from its discs, and Bosch lists cappuccino, latte macchiato and hot milk, all made via T DISC. For the Genio, De’Longhi doesn’t say which milk drinks the capsules cover. In the pod-system threads we read, a few people found milk pods disappointing. If a latte made with your own milk is the point, look at a pod machine with a milk system in our best pod coffee machines roundup, or add a separate frother. A tie.
Controls and cup sizes
The Tassimo does more of the thinking. Its scanner reads each disc’s barcode and sets the water, temperature and brewing time, then brews at one press of the button. Bosch’s manual says a short press stops a drink early and holding the button makes it longer than the disc’s setting. Water is heated on demand, so there’s no warm-up, and the cup stand lifts out for tall glasses and mugs. The Genio S Plus uses buttons, switches itself on when you open the clamp handle and take out the capsule holder, and switches off five minutes after the last drink. De’Longhi doesn’t describe how it sets cup sizes, so the Tassimo takes this one.
Descaling
Tassimo’s routine is written down and simple. When the descale light comes on, dissolve two Tassimo descaling tablets in a full tank, put the yellow service T DISC (kept in the machine) in the brew head barcode-down, and hold the button. The cycle takes about 30 minutes, then you run three or four rinses. Tassimo suggests descaling about four times a year, so a pack of four tablets (TCZ6004) covers two descales. It advises against vinegar and other acid descalers, and Bosch’s manual says never to use one containing phosphoric acid, or to fill the tank with chemically softened water. We couldn’t read the Genio’s descaling instructions; De’Longhi’s UK support page for the EDG315.B lists its manual. Tassimo wins here; our hard-water descaling guide covers how often.
Safety: Tassimo has you stand an empty container that holds at least 500 ml under the outlet before you start a descale. Bosch’s manual says not to touch hot parts and to let them cool after use, and never to run the machine inside a cupboard or from an extension lead or multi-socket strip.
Size and water tank
Bosch publishes the Tassimo’s size in full: 26.5 cm tall, 17.1 cm wide and 32 cm deep, 1.9 kg, with a 0.7-litre removable tank. That’s a small tank, so expect to refill it often. De’Longhi gives the Genio S Plus’s weight, about 2.1 kg, and calls it light and compact, but its UK page publishes neither the tank size nor the dimensions, so we can’t compare footprints or tanks. Measure your space and check the listing at the shop you buy from. A tie until De’Longhi publishes the numbers.
Recycling
Both systems recycle through Podback, the not-for-profit scheme Nestlé and Jacobs Douwe Egberts launched in 2021. Tassimo and Dolce Gusto pods are plastic, so both go in Podback’s green bag; the white bag is for aluminium pods. Drain the liquid, but there’s no need to scoop out the grounds. Some councils collect the bags from the kerbside; elsewhere there are supermarket drop-off points and Podback containers at council recycling centres. On the machines themselves, Bosch says 57% of the Style Friendly’s plastic is recycled, leaving out the parts that touch food; De’Longhi gives no figure for the Genio. A tie on the pods.
What owners report
Owner evidence is thin on both machines, so read this as a handful of reports, not a failure rate.
- Tassimo Style Friendly: we read 37 owner reviews on Tassimo’s own UK shop, all from verified buyers. Most praise how easy it is to use and how little worktop it takes, and several bought it to replace an older Tassimo. Three found the full tank awkward to put back or easy to spill, one said a tankful covers only about two cups, one found it very slow, and one said it sometimes fails to brew a disc, which is then wasted. One bought another after an identical machine stopped working after three years. Reviews on a brand’s own shop come from people who bought there, so they may lean positive.
- Genio S Plus: we found only one owner review we could count, on De’Longhi’s UK shop. It said the manual doesn’t mention that the cup button stops a drink mid-flow. That’s far too little to judge how the machine holds up.
- The systems in general: in older UK forum threads about pod systems that we read, a few Tassimo users found the coffee weak or not hot enough, and some found branded discs harder to find in shops. Those posts are about the system, not this model.
Pods are where the running cost sits with either system. We don’t quote pod prices, but our guide to working out the cost per cup shows how to compare packs: divide the pack price by the pods in it, and count every pod that goes into one drink.
Which should you choose?
Choose the Dolce Gusto Genio S Plus if…
- You want cold and iced drinks as well as hot ones
- You like a machine that switches on when you open the clamp and off five minutes after the last drink
- You already buy Dolce Gusto capsules and know the range suits you
- You can live with knowing little about its tank, size and upkeep before you buy
Choose the Tassimo Style Friendly if…
- Your household wants tea, hot chocolate and milky coffees from one machine
- You’d like each disc’s barcode to set the drink, with no warm-up wait
- You want written descaling steps and tablets you can find by part number
- Worktop space is tight and a 0.7-litre tank won’t bother you
Neither quite right? Our best pod coffee machines ranks every pod machine we track, and Nespresso Original vs Vertuo settles the other big pod question. Or browse every Dolce Gusto machine and every Tassimo we track.
Where to buy
Prices move often, so check the current figures before you decide.
Where to buy the Nescafé Dolce Gusto Genio S Plus
- De’Longhi£99.99Go to De’Longhi (opens in a new tab)
Prices and stock change; the retailer’s page is always the final word.
Where to buy the Tassimo by Bosch Style Friendly
- Hughes£69.97Go to Hughes (opens in a new tab)
Prices and stock change; the retailer’s page is always the final word.
Dolce Gusto vs Tassimo questions
Can you recycle Tassimo and Dolce Gusto pods?
Yes, through Podback. Both are plastic pods, so they go in Podback’s green bag, while aluminium pods use the white one. Drain the liquid first; you don’t need to scoop out the grounds. Some councils collect the bags at the kerbside, and elsewhere there are drop-off points. Podback’s Recycle Checker asks for your machine, pod type and postcode and shows your options. Pods from brands outside the scheme aren’t accepted.
Can I descale a Tassimo with vinegar?
No. Tassimo says vinegar and other acid descalers can damage the machine and spoil the taste, and recommends its own tablets: two per descale, dissolved in a full tank. Bosch’s manual for the Style range also says never to use a descaler containing phosphoric acid. The cycle runs with the yellow service T DISC in the brew head, takes about 30 minutes, and is followed by three or four rinses.
Do they switch themselves off?
Yes. De’Longhi says the Genio S Plus switches off 5 minutes after the last drink, and on again when you open the clamp handle. Bosch says the Tassimo goes into standby straight after brewing and into off mode within 30 minutes at most, when it draws 0.3 W. GB rules require home coffee machines like these to drop to low power within 30 minutes of the last drink anyway.
What warranty do they come with?
Two years each. De’Longhi lists a two-year warranty for the Genio S Plus and invites you to register it, and Bosch’s standard two-year warranty covers manufacturing and material faults with parts and labour. Separately, the Consumer Rights Act gives you 30 days to reject a faulty machine, and a fault that appears within six months is presumed to have been there from the start.
