Answer: Yes, at least as far as my tastebuds are concerned.

However, as others have said, espresso sweetness has a different character and amplitude than the intense sweetness of sugar, honey, maple syrup, corn syrup, etc. It's more akin to the sweetness you can taste in various kinds of produce. It's typically much less prominent than raw, cooked or dried fruit sugars, but similar to vegetable sugars like what you can taste in raw or al-dente cooked broccoli, asparagus, green beans, corn (not as much as sweet corn), etc.

Typically, I don't taste sweetness in espresso right off the bat. I'm more sensitive to acidity, which I like, so on the first sip my first impression is always whether the cup is bright or muted, with "coffee" flavor somewhat in the background. On subsequent sips, flavors begin to separate, and I taste whatever fruit, sweetness, chocolate and/or bitterness there is. I usually taste fruit and sweetness as soon as the coffee hits my tongue, and often they last into the aftertaste. Chocolate and bitter flavors tend to be more of an aftertaste thing for me.

Sweetness is often masked by flaws in the roasting and/or extraction. Grassy and/or vegetal flavors of underdeveloped light roasts will dominate a cup, as will charred and/or roasty flavors of dark roasts. It's hard to taste any sweeteness with those flavors assaulting your senses. Even with perfectly roasted beans, if your espresso is under-extracted, sourness will dominate the cup and it'll be hard to taste any sweetness. If your espresso is over-extracted, bitter flavors will dominate. Many times, emergence of sweetness is a good indicator that you got the extraction dialed in right. On top of all that, some origins have more sweetness than others. I agree that well-produced, well-roasted and well-extracted naturals can be sweeter than washed coffees, but sometimes "funky" fermentation flavors will mask the sweetness.

I never put sugar in my espresso or espresso-based milk drinks (or in my brewed coffee, for that matter.) With the right coffee, roast level and extraction, added sugar isn't necessary for me -- there's enough sweetness to counter the natural bitter flavors. Sugar almost always makes the coffee taste worse -- cloying, flavors masked, etc. -- unless the coffee is really bad to begin with (think Starbucks.) In that case, I can't drink the coffee without sugar, and even then it's likely to go unfinished.

I wouldn't call true Italian espresso "bad", but it's very hard to drink without sugar. That's why they serve it with a couple of sugar cubes or a big tube of raw sugar. With sugar, it's a very pleasant drink, not cloying, but there's no origin flavor in there and definitely no natural sweetness. There's chocolate, but I believe that's mostly roast flavor, or maybe some magic that happens when Arabica and Robusta are blended. On of my favorite parts is eating the coffee-soaked grains of sugar at the bottom of the cup when the liquid is gone. I think of Italian espresso as a confection that's really nice with pastry in the morning or by itself sitting in a street cafe looking at the sights and watching the people go by. It's not at all like the specialty coffee experience I have in US cafes and at home.

I should point out that while I've always drunk my home espresso without added sugar, it took me many years to develop an ability to separate flavors, at least the basic ones, and truly recognize the "sweetness" in high-quality, well-prepared espresso.

Peppersass wrote: Sweetness is often masked by flaws in the roasting and/or extraction. Grassy and/or vegetal flavors of underdeveloped light roasts will dominate a cup, as will charred and/or roasty flavors of dark roasts. It's hard to taste any sweeteness with those flavors assaulting your senses. Even with perfectly roasted beans, if your espresso is under-extracted, sourness will dominate the cup and it'll be hard to taste any sweetness. If your espresso is over-extracted, bitter flavors will dominate. Many times, emergence of sweetness is a good indicator that you got the extraction dialed in right.

^^this. Especially with light roasts, prominent sweetness is the hallmark of espresso dialed-in IMO. It's my primary dial-in target. But getting the grind+dose size, ratio, and temperature right all at the same time is not an easy task in my experience because they vary a lot from coffee to coffee. But boy when I get them right, it's a sublime drink.

Since buying my Monolith Flat with the Shuriken Sweet burrs I get sweetness regularly. And I mean sweet, sometimes almost so much that I have to overextract a bit bit to add some bitterness for balance. I'm often pulling short of 2:1 ratios with some form or another of extended pre-infusion.

Of course the beans being used have to have it to begin with and lots of African coffees having only a hint of certain kinds of sweetness.

I would say that sweetness of one kind or another is one of the hallmarks of well made espresso.
FWIW I did get it in a smaller way and less consistently with my aligned Vario grinder.

A lot of you are claiming that there is indeed a sweet espresso out there. How can I buy one or make one?

Rather than having two threads on the same topic, I'm temporarily closing this one. Contributors are welcome to continue the discussion in Can espresso actually taste sweet?