If your pour-over tastes weak, bitter, or just "off," it's almost never your beans — it's your ratio.

Most beginners eyeball it. Don't. Use this:

1:16 (coffee to water, by weight)

Example: 20g coffee → 320g water (not ml — weigh your water too, it's more accurate than volume).

Why this fixes almost everything:

• Tastes sour/weak → you're under-extracting. Grind finer or go closer to 1:15.

• Tastes bitter/harsh → you're over-extracting. Grind coarser or go closer to 1:17.

• Tastes "muddy" or inconsistent → your grind size is uneven (blade grinders are usually the culprit — a cheap hand grinder fixes this instantly).

One more thing nobody tells beginners: bloom your coffee first. Pour just enough water to saturate the grounds (about 2x the coffee weight), wait 30-45 seconds, then do the rest of your pour in slow circles. That bloom step alone fixes a lot of flat-tasting coffee because it lets trapped CO2 escape before full extraction.

Weigh everything, time your bloom, and you'll taste the difference in one cup. Happy to answer questions if you're stuck on a specific brew.