It’s costing you a latte more for that cup of coffee lately, and here’s why

National Coffee Day is approaching on September 29. Good thing this article is free to read, because the price of that cup of joe keeps reaching new heights. So let’s grind out our latest coffee data.

Prices continue to percolate

In August 2025, Canadians paid 27.9% more for their coffee at the grocery store than they did a year earlier. By type, the increase was sharper for roasted or ground coffee (+35.2%), but less so for instant and other coffee (+19.7%).

On an average annual basis, the price of coffee increased 81.3% from 1979 to 2024. While there’s been quite the sticker shock recently, the largest single-year increase on record was in 1995 (+36.0%).

However, consider this: from 1979 to 2024, the overall inflation rate for food purchased from stores (+330.2%) increased by a considerably higher rate than for coffee. So, coffee drinkers, at least you can tell yourself that over the long term, any given cup of coffee you’ve brewed has, in a sense, been an inflation-buster!

Coffee (and pretty much everything else!) is costing more these days at your favourite restaurant or café. Prices for food purchased from fast food and take-out restaurants (+5.9%) and cafeterias and other restaurants (+3.2%) were up year-over-year in August 2025.

Growing conditions largely contribute to producer, retail price hikes

Unfavourable weather conditions in growing regions led to higher prices for coffee beans, not only pushing up prices in stores, cafés, and restaurants, but also manufacturers’ costs. In a typical month, about one-quarter of coffee bean imports come from Colombia, while those from Brazil, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, and Peru make up most of the remainder.

From January to July 2025, Canada imported 131.0 million kilograms of coffee (not roasted or decaffeinated), valued at over $1.3 billion. On an annual basis, all-time highs in both quantity (215.4 million kg) and value (over $1.4 billion) were reached in 2024. The previous high for quantity was in 2019 (205.6 million kg), and for value, 2022 (nearly $1.4 billion).

Canada also imported 3.9 million kg of roasted coffee (not decaffeinated) in July 2025, most of it from the United States. Roasted coffee products are among those affected by tariffs charged by the United States on its own coffee imports and were also affected by Canada’s tariff countermeasures until September 1, possibly affecting costs for some Canadian importers.

Canada imports relatively smaller amounts of decaffeinated coffee products (both roasted and not roasted) in a typical month.

In July 2025, factory gate prices for the coffee and tea commodity group charged by Canadian manufacturers rose 30.1% from a year earlier, as measured by the Industrial Product Price Index.

However, demand from retailers and distributors is still high. On a seasonally unadjusted basis in July 2025, the coffee and tea manufacturing industry sold and shipped $292.8 million worth of product, not far off from the all-time monthly high reached in October 2022 ($292.9 million).

Also in July 2025, the estimated values (unadjusted) at month’s end of raw materials, fuel, supplies, and components stood at $336.8 million, the highest value in over two years and an indication of the industry’s ever-increasing costs of doing business.

Newfoundland and Labrador households are top coffee spenders

Every two years, we release detailed grocery spending data as part of the Survey of Household Spending. The latest data are from 2023, when households nationwide spent an average of $164 on roasted and ground coffee, up from $150 in 2021. The data series goes as far back as 2010, when the average expenditure was $64 per household.

Among provinces and territorial capitals in 2023, households in Newfoundland and Labrador spent the most ($260), followed by Yellowknife, Northwest Territories ($243), and Quebec ($199). Less money was spent on instant and other coffee.

Many adults consume coffee; fewer youth and adults consume sugary coffee beverages or iced tea

In 2015, the average expenditure on roasted or ground coffee was $115 per household. In that same year, we also asked Canadians about their coffee consumption as part of the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS). About 3 in 5 Canadians aged 19 to 50 reported consuming coffee the day before we surveyed them, while about 3 in 4 of those aged 51 to 71 did.

In 2023, just under 1 in 5 Canadians aged 18 and older reported drinking sweetened coffee beverages or iced tea at least once a day, according to more recent CCHS data. The 2023 Canadian Health Survey on Children and Youth found that 1 in 20 youth aged 12 to 17 consumed at least one sugary coffee beverage or iced tea per day.