Standing Desk Starter Guide

It tin can be easy to talk yourself out of standing at a figurer desk-bound. As well the feat of parting with your favorite office chair, the price of most adaptable models would exist enough to discourage many people from inquiring further. Truth be told, however, the transition doesn't accept to be an expensive all-or-nothing matter.

Read on for a applied outlook on what you lot can expect from your first standing desk-bound, peculiarly if you're still torn between edifice something yourself and having one shipped to your door.

Annotation: This feature was originally published on December 26, 2016. We've revised, added to it, and bumped it as office of our #ThrowbackThursday initiative.

Don't: Purchase a standing desk-bound expecting information technology to be comfy out of the box. Non but volition it accept time for your body to conform to standing for a majority of the day if yous're used to sitting for pretty much all of it, merely y'all may also have to invest in boosted hardware and accessories. For example, many if not about standing desks are sold without the equipment you'll need to go your monitor where y'all demand it. Although marketing pictures often show models grinning down at their display, this wouldn't be comfortable for long and information technology actually seems misleading to imply that information technology'southward a viable way to prepare things up for the average person, who would typically want the display somewhere around head-height.

Practice: Consider buying a standing desk if yous're uncomfortable with sitting at the PC all mean solar day, simply not under the impression that it'south somehow ameliorate to stand in the same place for 8 hours straight instead of sitting. Finding a mode to exist in a variety of positions throughout the solar day is platonic, which makes it easy to understand the ascension popularity of adjustable standing desks, though not-adjustable options might not exist as much of a sacrifice equally they may seem.

Refold is a successful kickstarter from a few years ago. Also check out the Spark

Don't: Retrieve yous have to spend big. Adjustable desks commonly approach $1,000 and many are well beyond, but you tin can build a basic standing desk past mounting a finished piece of plywood to the wall. Googling "diy standing desks" returns a deluge of unique ideas that would do the trick, even if it'southward only for temporary testing. Quick and dirty designs to change your existing desk range from stacking books, boxes and printer newspaper on height for raising your keyboard/mouse/monitor, or cinderblocks underneath to elevator the unabridged desk-bound.

Tip: If you're building a standing platform, go larger than you think. Besides the potential for tippage, your posture/comfort will suffer if your feet overlap the edges of your platform as you alter stances.

Don't: Be completely convinced that your continuing desk needs to have an adjustable top (unless, of course, you do...). Information technology'southward like shooting fish in a barrel to see the appeal of a workstation that shifts between sitting and continuing, particularly if y'all're looking to take things slowly at the start, simply getting used to being on your feet for a majority of the day shouldn't be too difficult for the average good for you adult and y'all can still find ways to be in a variety of positions without having your desk-bound motility at the touch of a push button.

Do: Accept a plan for wire direction, especially if y'all intendance about aesthetics and intend to go DIY. Keeping your cables make clean may exist less of a concern if your prefabricated desk comes with integrated channels for routing everything, but fifty-fifty and then, you might find that you need extension cords for your displays and other devices to achieve their destination. Aiming for a high caste of adjustability tends to be the goal of going for a standing desk and that will only make matters trickier.

The Jarvis Standing Desk-bound Bamboo is considered by many the best value adjustable motorized standing desk-bound in the marketplace

Don't: Stand at your PC in footwear with raised heels or anything else that'due south going to compromise your posture. This will cause considerably more than discomfort in almost every body part involved with continuing. Wearing flat-bottomed shoes results in less stiffness and standing in but socks or barefoot should evidence to exist the least bothersome over long hours. If the floor itself is unpleasant to stand on, many people put a rubber mat or some other form of padding where they work, though others suggest this is counterproductive because the comfort dissuades you from moving, potentially encouraging you to remain in poor positions longer.

Tip: Standing at a desk makes you more alert/less drowsy and anecdotally, I feel more than prone to looking around the room (information technology's recommended that PC users take such eye breaks).

Do: Have breaks. This should include sitting occasionally, and although this would seem like the betoken at which adjustable desk owners would lower their workstation to keep going, y'all might find that by the fourth dimension you lot're ready to sit, you're besides ready for a pause from work and walking a few feet abroad from the PC is no big deal when yous really want to balance. As unintuitive as it may seem, walking around sometimes resets the feeling of fatigue or stiffness that sets in later on prolonged sessions at a continuing setup, as will stretching.

If there'southward no time to take a intermission, leaning for a few minutes is often enough of a breather and it might be worth buying a soft wrist-rest to double as an elbow-rest when y'all're taking a load-off. It'due south also nice to accept something a few inches or more off the ground to put a foot on as you shift your weight around.

Don't: Assume you won't be able to discover a way to sit down down while however using your 'continuing-only' workstation. A drafting stool would be an easy and affordable solution to sitting higher than conventional computer chairs. Conversely, y'all may likewise be able to become abroad with raising your regular office chair to its max height, lowering your display to the standing desk's surface (which should put it about heart-level) and and then moving your keyboard/mouse to your lap.

If you want to go creative, you could go as far as having a Television set on your desk and a couch in the distance with a wireless keyboard/mouse. This is all without mentioning the fact that you could hop on a laptop or another mobile device depending on what you're doing and then return to your PC later.

Tip: Putting your keyboard/mouse on a movable platform will brand it easier to transition away from your not-adjustable standing desk. Put some casters on the bottom of the tray and information technology will swivel with you as you stand.

Exercise: Prepare to exist hungrier and thirstier if you transition to standing most or all of the solar day. Standing burns more than calories than sitting (50 more than an hour according to Google), and as mentioned, you'll probably exist doing more than than just continuing every bit it quickly becomes addiction to roam or stretch during idle moments. With all the actress moving going on and replenishments around, don't be surprised when yous elbow the starting time or fifth thing off your desk.