Some people question whether the Presso makes "real" espresso as defined by 9+ bars of pressure. I don't have a technical answer as I have no way to measure, but if your tamp and grind are right, a lot of pressure is built up and the coffee is extracted under pressure. I nearly stalled the machine a couple of times, building up enough pressure that it felt like something might break if I dared to press down harder. The bed of ground coffee is what determines the extraction pressure, where the amount of coffee, its freshness and tamping technique determines how many bars of pressure the pull will require. In that sense its real espresso. An interesting modification would be to tap into the side of the unit to insert a gauge to give a visual indication of the pressure (and water temperature). That would give important feedback to the operator so they could fine tune their technique.