We hate to brag but we’re aficionados when it comes to the best office chairs. We’ve scoured over 60 manufacturers to find the best office chairs of 2020. Although it’s been hard to whittle our list down, our top 6 have been determined by their superior comfort, aesthetic, green credentials and unique design features.
Best green office chair
Manufacturers are keen to show off the green credentials of their creations, and rightly so! In the UK alone, an estimated 13.5 tonnes of furniture end up in landfill each year. In an effort to combat these wasteful ways, our winner had to be The Senator Group Ousby chair.
The Senator Group are renowned for creating elegant, innovative furniture designs which not only look beautiful but minimise the impact on the world around us. The Ousby chair is made out of at least 36.5% of recyclable material and is 99% recyclable if you ever decide to get a new chair. Green credentials aside, the lightweight ergonomically shaped mesh back makes for a seriously comfortable and attractive chair.
This chair has a 5-year warranty (that we are confident it will surpass) but at the end of your chairs life, your chair can also meet its end back where it all started. The Senator Group has a purpose-built £1.5million 15,000ft2 recycling unit that has recycled more than 270,000 items and diverted more than 7.5million kg of waste from landfill since establishing this business. This equates to an emissions saving of 8,790,798 Kg/CO2.
Best office chair for design buffs
This was a particularly difficult category to judge given the painstaking detail that goes into creating an ergonomic chair. Considering some of the smartest functionality we’ve seen this year, the HÅG SoFi range has won the heart of our hardest to impress design buff.
The SoFi chair features unique slide back arms. Paired with a patented HÅG Balance® (balanced, flowing tilt function backwards and forwards) mechanism, this chair has been scrupulously designed to move with your body and encourage a more active workday. You can watch how the SoFi came to fruition here.
Best office chair for a bad back
Three years of research and development have resulted in a product which offers great adjustability, shifting the status quo in specialist ergonomic seating. This is why the Orangebox Flo chair had our vote for the best office chair for a bad back.
The Flo chair offers a brilliant level of moulded back support with an inflatable lumbar and thoracic cells as standard. Together with a high, sculpted, ergonomic back-rest, the Flo provides relief for people that suffer from a bad back.
The level of specialist options that the Flo offers (e.g coccyx cut-outs, headrests & different height gas-lifts) enables us to specify the chair for each individual back or muscular condition that comes our way. Combined with the high level of adjustability, the Flo has proven itself many times over as one of the best office chairs for back pain.
Best chair for home workers
We can’t really take credit for judging this one as the people have well and truly spoken! Since March 2020, we’ve relied on home working more than ever before. With this came the cravings for a solid, comfortable and lightweight chair for the home office. Without a doubt, the most popular home working chair has been the Tonique chair.
The Tonique has been an antidote for people that have struggled to work from a stiff dining room chair. The 3D mesh back varies in density to provide smooth graduation of tension with the fullest support starting at your lower back and spine. The Tonique also features a self-regulating mechanism that auto-balances itself to match your body weight. This essentially means that the backrest gently rocks whilst still offering a good level of support.
“Recently bought a Tonique chair, for home working, based on a recommendation from Posture People. The chair itself is fantastic, and has made the long days of sitting at a home desk really comfortable.”
Richard 2020
Best budget specialist chair
We picked the Orthopaedica series as the best budget specialist chair of 2020. The product of a brief from the NHS, the Orthopaedica range offers a plethora of bespoke options to cater to a range of individuals and their conditions.
Amongst other options, the Orthopedica can include inflatable thoracic and lumbar supports, a unique ‘air tech’ seat, coccyx comfort zone, sculpted back and a generous seat to offer support wherever you need it the most.
Judging by the positive feedback we’ve received about the Orthopaedica over the past year, it’s become an indisputable favourite for budget-conscious companies. You can read more about why our expert assessor recommends the Orthopaedica series for back pain here.
Best all rounder
Our best all-rounder office chair award goes to the Viasit Drumback chair. Whilst it doesn’t offer the bespoke back care features of the Orthopaedica or Flo, the Drumback has a unique hybrid mesh back stretch tight like the skin of a drum making it both comfortable and supportive.
This unique design and robust construction has made the Drumback chair a popular standard office chair over the past year. Take a look at why Wired Sussex decided to go with the Drumback chair.
This is by no means an exhaustive list of all the brilliant office chairs from reputable manufacturers. If you buy once, buy right, and buy for your body you’ll have great results with your new office chair. If you’d like advice about finding the best office chair for you, then please leave us a message below!
