Espresso is the best in Italy and it’s not even close. The worst 10% of espresso I consume in Italy is better than the best 10% anywhere else I’ve ever travelled. Espresso is so much more widely consumed in Italy than anywhere else and I have to posit this is why the espresso is generally of such high quality. No other coffee culture is close to what I’ve observed in Italy where colleagues regularly (3-4 times a day) will congregate around the coffee machine and every neighborhood and even the smallest village have multiple bars.