If you have ever stood in the kitchen holding a handful of vegetable scraps and wondered whether to throw them in a compost bin or try that bokashi thing everyone is talking about you are not alone. Both compost and bokashi turn food waste into something that your garden will love. They do it in very different ways and one might be a lot better for your home than the other.
Here at Kai Kai Farm we have spent years using bokashi on our farm on Tamborine Mountain so people ask us about this a lot. Let us talk about how each method works, where they're different and how to decide which one or maybe both is right, for your kitchen, your garden and the way you live.
How Each Method Works
Bokashi: Anaerobic Fermentation
Bokashi isn't composting in the traditional sense, it's fermentation. You layer food scraps into a sealed bokashi bin with a sprinkle of organic bokashi bran (inoculated with beneficial EM-1 microorganisms) after each addition, then seal the lid. Because the process happens without oxygen, the microbes "pickle" the waste rather than breaking it down the way a garden compost pile does.
After about two weeks, you're left with a pre-compost that still resembles the original food, plus a nutrient-rich liquid you can drain off and use as a fertiliser. It's a quiet, tidy process that happens entirely indoors, which is a big part of its appeal.
Traditional Composting: Aerobic Decomposition
Composting the way needs a few things to work. It needs air, water and a mix of food scraps and grass clippings which are called "greens" and dry leaves and cardboard which are called "browns". These things help the living things like bacteria and fungi that are already there. They break down the scraps and leaves and other stuff when they have air. That is why people turn the pile of compost every now and then.
When it is all done the compost is dark and crumbly. It is ready to put in the garden. This is the way most people learned how to compost. It works well when you have a lot of space outside to make a big pile of compost and turn it regularly. Composting this way is good, for people who have a garden and want to use compost to make their plants grow. Composting is a way to make your garden beds ready for plants to grow in them.
Head-to-Head Comparison
Speed: 2 Weeks vs 3–12 Months
This is where bokashi and traditional composting really go in directions. Bokashi breaks down in two weeks so you get something you can use as pre-compost really fast. Traditional composting takes a lot longer it can take anywhere from three months to one year it just depends on how big your compost pile's what the weather is like and how often you mix it up.
If you're impatient (no judgement, most of us are), bokashi's speed is a genuine drawcard.
What Waste Each Can Handle (Meat, Dairy, Cooked Food)
Here's a detail that surprises a lot of people: bokashi can handle meat, dairy, cooked leftovers, citrus, and even small bones, foods that would normally attract pests or rot unpleasantly in a traditional pile. The sealed, anaerobic environment ferments them safely, which is exactly why we built our bokashi range around handling the "hard stuff" that regular compost bins tell you to leave out.
Traditional composting generally sticks to raw fruit and veggie scraps, coffee grounds, eggshells, and garden waste. Meat and dairy are usually a no-go, since they decompose slowly in open air and tend to smell, and attract animals.
Odour, Flies & Pests
A well-run bokashi bin has a mild, pickled aroma (a sign it's fermenting correctly) and, because it's sealed, doesn't attract fruit flies or vermin. Traditional compost, especially if it's too wet or has the wrong greens-to-browns ratio, can smell earthy-sour and occasionally draw flies or curious wildlife if it's not properly contained.
Space & Indoor Suitability
The thing that really matters is Bokashi bins. Bokashi bins are small and closed so you can put a kitchen caddy under the sink in the room or on the balcony. You do not need a backyard for Bokashi bins. Traditional compost bins are different. Traditional compost bins need to be outside; they need air to flow around them. They need to be in a spot where you can easily turn them and get to them all year round.
What You Get Out: Pre-Compost + Liquid vs Finished Compost
Bokashi gives you two outputs: a nutrient-dense liquid (diluted 1:100 for use as liquid fertiliser) and a fermented pre-compost that still needs to finish breaking down, typically buried in soil or added to a traditional compost system for a few more weeks. Traditional composting gives you one finished product: ready-to-use compost, no further processing needed.
Cost Comparison: Setup & Ongoing
A basic bokashi setup, a complete bin and bran kit, is a modest upfront cost, with ongoing spend on replacement bran (or you can make your own with a DIY bran starter kit if you want to keep costs down long-term). A traditional compost bin or bay is often a one-off purchase or DIY build with essentially no recurring costs, though you may want to buy in "browns" if your household doesn't generate enough dry material naturally.
In short: bokashi has a small ongoing cost for convenience and speed; traditional composting is cheaper long-term but asks for more space and patience.
Which Should You Choose?
Apartment or Small Courtyard
Bokashi is the clear winner here. It's odour-controlled, doesn't need outdoor space, and handles the kind of food waste (cooked meals, dairy) that renters and apartment-dwellers actually produce day to day. A compact bokashi kitchen caddy tucks neatly under most sinks.
Family Home With a Garden
This is where you can have the best of both worlds. Many families run a bokashi bin in the kitchen for daily scraps, including meat and dairy, then bury the fermented pre-compost in the garden or feed it into a traditional bin to finish off.
Large Garden or Small Acreage
If you've got the space and the volume of garden waste (grass clippings, prunings, fallen leaves), a traditional compost system will likely be your main engine, with bokashi as a handy sidekick for kitchen scraps that would otherwise sit in the bin.
Why Many Gardeners Run Both Systems
Honestly, this is what we see most often, and it's not a compromise, it's a genuinely smart setup. Bokashi handles the tricky stuff (meat, dairy, cooked food) fast and without fuss indoors, while the fermented output gets buried or added to an outdoor compost pile to finish breaking down into full, garden-ready compost.
You end up diverting far more food waste from landfill than either method alone would manage, and your garden gets a steady supply of both liquid fertiliser and finished compost. If you want to take it further, our fermented plant extracts and tonics pair beautifully with bokashi liquid to build even richer soil microbiology.
Getting Started With Bokashi
If you're keen to try it, the process is refreshingly simple:
-
Layer food scraps into your bokashi bin, sprinkling organic bokashi bran over each layer
-
Press down to remove air pockets and seal the lid tightly
-
Drain the liquid every couple of days through the tap (dilute it 1:100 for use as fertiliser)
-
Once full, leave the sealed bin for about two weeks to finish fermenting
-
Bury the pre-compost in soil or your garden bed, or add it to a traditional compost pile
For a full walkthrough, including troubleshooting tips if your bin smells "off" rather than pleasantly tangy, our Bokashi Bran & Bins Guide & FAQ covers it all.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Is bokashi really compost? Not quite, bokashi is fermentation, not decomposition. What you get after two weeks is a "pre-compost" that still looks like the original food but has been preserved and broken down by beneficial microbes. It needs to be buried in soil or added to a traditional compost pile to fully break down into finished, garden-ready compost.
Q: Can bokashi pre-compost go into a normal compost bin? Yes, and it's one of the best ways to use it. Because it's already partially fermented, bokashi pre-compost breaks down quickly once added to an aerobic compost pile, often within a few weeks, giving your traditional compost an extra nutrient boost in the process.
Q: Can bokashi handle all my kitchen scraps, including meat and dairy? Yes, that's one of its biggest advantages over traditional composting. The sealed, anaerobic environment safely ferments meat, dairy, cooked meals, and citrus without the odour or pest issues these foods would cause in an open compost pile.
Q: How much space does each method need? Bokashi needs very little, a bin small enough to fit under a sink or in a cupboard. Traditional composting needs outdoor space with room to turn the pile and good airflow, so it's better suited to homes with a backyard or courtyard.
Q: Will my bokashi bin smell bad? A properly maintained bokashi bin shouldn't smell bad at all, just a mild, pickled tang, which is a sign the fermentation is working. A strong, rotten smell usually means too much liquid has built up or the lid hasn't been sealed properly between additions.
The Bottom Line
There's no single "better" method, it comes down to your space, your household's food waste, and how quickly you want results. Bokashi is fast, indoor-friendly, and handles the foods traditional composting can't; traditional composting is low-cost and produces a finished product without any extra steps. For many home gardeners, running both side by side is the way to turn almost all your food waste into something your garden actually benefits from.
If you're not sure where to start, browse our full bokashi range or get in touch, we're a family farm, and we're always happy to help you find the setup that fits your home. You can also read more about our story on Tamborine Mountain if you're curious where all this fermentation obsession started