Over the last 20 years as engineers on Tech Support Helpdesk we’ve spent literally thousands of pounds on office chairs trying to find ‘the best office chair for working with computers’.

Every time we’ve chosen new chairs we’ve had input from everybody in the office and I think we have had every type of chair imaginable.

We’ve tried cheap chairs, chairs that look great, chairs that are super technical and have loads of features, ‘ergonomic’ chairs, chairs from showrooms with nice salespeople and chairs that look like a fantastic deal straight from office furniture websites.

The truth is that most new chairs feel quite comfortable in the first few seconds that you sit on them. If you sit there for a few minutes changing your position, swinging and twiddling the springy knob on the recline setting the chair feels different to the one that you currently sit on at work (which is probably worn out) and you can convince yourself that the chair you’re now sitting in is great…but is it?

It is only after you’ve used the chair for a few weeks or months that the real truth about the chair you thought was great comes out and the things that are not quite right with it start to niggle or annoy you. Additionally, it’s only after a few months to a year that a poor quality chair will actually show its true colours with something creaking, wobbling, breaking or a piece coming off in your hand.

Whilst the not-so-great-now chair might have some form of a warranty, the chances are you can’t be bothered to argue poor quality versus chair abuse versus reasonable wear and tear with the company that supplied it and you need a chair to keep working regardless. Equally, even if the company you bought it from is happy to replace it you probably don’t want the same type of chair again in exchange for your broken one. Bottom line: You’re not-so-great-now office chair is probably heading to the recycling centre leaving you to start the selection lottery process again.

If you’re reading this and can relate to the scenario above or if you are looking for a new office chair and have stumbled upon this article and really don’t want to enter the new office chair ‘money pit’ or ‘wheel of fortune’ at all then you are in luck. I’m glad to say that after all this time and wasted money I think we’ve finally found The Ultimate Office Chair.

There is no need to mess you around holding you in suspense, forcing you to read more and more inching ever closer to the answer. We are not sponsored and have no ads, so here it is plain and simple:

In our opinion, the best office chair for working with computers in the world is the Herman Miller Aeron Remastered.

So there you have it, you can stop wasting any more time and money, we have told you the answer. Go out and buy one.

But why is it the best office chair for working with computers? What makes us say this? How would we know and what qualifies us to pass judgement? Here’s why:

We sit at our desks ALL DAY, tapping away on our computers with three screens each. If the chair isn’t right for us it becomes apparent very quickly and leads to a loss of concentration, the need to stand up due to discomfort, back pain or having to constantly shift position in the chair attempting to find the non-existent ‘sweet spot’.

In short the Herman Miller Aeron Remastered chair is the chair that works for us, all day, every day, all year round with zero pain and frustration. The Aeron chair combines simple and sustainable comfort with superb reliability and sorry, no, it isn’t ‘cheap’ at all but we’d argue that in the long run it is actually very good value. At first glance, the price of this chair will take most people’s breath away and unless you’ve been through the years of money pumping on office chairs already you might be tempted to look elsewhere for a cheaper alternate. It is however, the only chair we’ll endorse, swear by and purchase now.

We must have been pretty ignorant to have missed these chairs historically because we discovered that what we are now sitting on is actually a reworking of an already iconic chair (the Herman Miller Aeron).

You don’t have to do too much digging to realise that these chairs can be found in offices, recording and TV studios worldwide and there’s a reason for this: They are simply awesome. You really can sit on one of these all day and not be uncomfortable. The build quality is second to none and they’re manufactured in different sizes to suit different humans (and this last point is really important as we humans are not all built the same).

These Herman Miller Aeron chairs are so sought after that a healthy second hand/refurbished market exists for them where demand regularly outweighs supply. Quite often used chairs are changing hands at more money than we were buying our other chairs brand new but BUYER BEWARE: we ordered 8 refurbished first generation Herman Miller Aeron chairs from the most prominent second hand dealers on the internet and every single one looked like it had had a very hard life and was faulty in some way or other. Far from being properly refurbished these looked like they were picked up on the way to the knackers yard, dusted off and sent directly to us with no work done at all. Needless to say we returned them for a full refund immediately.

We ended up biting the bullet and buying brand new chairs and after a few weeks it dawned on me… There is no way I would give up this chair voluntarily. It would have to be broken or totally worn out for me to even consider parting with it so no wonder the ‘refurbished’ chairs were in the state they were. The Aeron chairs are so well made that you’d have to spend a considerable amount of money to put them back to almost new condition.

Ok so here’s the summary:

  1. Is the Herman Miller Aeron Remastered the best chair we have ever owned?

YES

  1. Have we received any incentive, payment, discount, rebate or otherwise from Herman Miller or any of its associates or affiliates to write this article?

NO

  1. Did we pay full price and wince in pain when parting with the money to buy them?

YES

  1. Would we spend the money on buying Aeron chairs again when the ones we have wear out?

YES – ABSOLUTELY

 

My cheaper office chairs were not truly comfortable and needed replacing after 1-2 years. My first Aeron chair (I bought one for work and one for the office at home) is now over 3 years old and still looks and feels like brand new. I’ve done the math and if my Aeron Chair lasts another 2 years (I have no doubt it will) it’ll actually have saved me money while making my working life a pleasure when sitting at my desk.

So there you have it an honest review about the chair we love, the Herman Miller Aeron Remastered, very simply: The best office chair for working with computers.