One too many James Hoffman videos and my blade grinder was already sitting sadly by the door, waiting to be disposed in Wertstoffhof (in Germany you can’t dispose of electronics in regular trash and have to bring them to a special place). And yes, the official version is it had to go because I crashed it some days ago and you had to hold the lid while grinding because it won’t close properly anymore.
And so I started an extensive research on grinders. I decided to go with an electric one pretty early on, since it was clear I will be getting an espresso machine sometime soon. It was important for me that the grinding consistency is very high, that it is capable of grinding espresso fine, that the burrs adjustment is stepless and that it looks somewhat pretty and not too bulky. I was okay with conical burrs for a start, since flat burrs were above my budget and an overkill for a first grinder. The same goes for ceramic vs. steel burrs: while I’d love to try ceramic burrs one day, steel were perfectly fine and even benefitial for me since they can hande a bit more wear and don’t have to be replaced that often. I figured overheating shouldn’t be a big problem for me considering my max. of 4 espresso shots per day. Also, I was planning to use the grinder for both filter and espresso and I read a lot that ceramic is mostly suitable for espresso. I wasn’t looking for much automation in the grinder either, because I knew I will be using scales to weigh my grinds anyways so I’d rather pay more for the build then for fancy features.
With all that and my budget of up to 400 EUR in mind I went with Eureka Mignon Silenzio in chrome to have a higher chance of matching my future espresso machine. Here are some pictures of very excited me when it arrived:

So far I am very happy with it, I like the compactness of it, I love how quiet it is compared to other grinders which is amazing when I want to make a coffee while my husband is on a call and generally doesn’t give you a headache first thing in the morning or shock you nerves. The anti-clumping screen that separates the grinds as they move down the shoot is also a great thing, however it still produces some clumps every once in a while, probably just less then without it. I use WDT anyways as part of my espresso prep routine, so it’s less of an issue for me. There is a shut-off gate in the hopper for the beans, but I don’t really see the use case for myself since I always weigh and portion my beans. Also I don’t really use the fork for resting the portafilter, since I grind in a cup and transfer the grinds into portafilter later with a funnel - in my experience way less mess. I have to say I don’t have much experience with other electric grinders so hard to compare, but I am generally happy with the retention rate, which is supposedly under 1 gr. I still purge a couple of grams if I change grind settings between filter and espresso, but seems to be within the claimed range. Also the maintenance and cleaning has been quite easy so far - a couple of screws and you can already brush and vaccum the burs. I am still convinced it is a very nice option for your first electric espresso grinder, especially paired with an espresso machine.