The Best Office Chairs for Working and Gaming: Our Top Tested & Reviewed Picks

The Anthros chair is one of my favorite chairs of 2025, and maybe all time. Since my review, the longer I've spent with it, the more I've come to appreciate its pelvis-first approach to comfort and support. It’s so effective that every time I’ve had to switch out to review another chair, I’ve immediately noticed the impact on my back and couldn’t wait to switch back. It’s a chair that needs to grow on you but is genuinely hard to go back from.

The key to the Anthros chair's magic is that it splits its backrest into pelvic and upper back supports that are each individually adjustable. The lower back/pelvis support aligns your spine into the proper position. The upper backrest is then adjusted outward to support you in a comfortable yet properly postured seating position without needing to think about it. This chair ensures that your body is aligned for your long-term health and comfort.

Its backrest is supported by a wide, highly contoured seat that cradles you in its center. Two cutouts under your bottom are invisible from the outside but reduce pressure on your body, enhancing its ergonomics. The width of its seat is also acommodating to the occasional leg tuck or “criss-cross apple-sauce" when you need a change of pace. The overall design ensures, as long as you’re sitting back, your spine will remain aligned, and you won’t need to worry about stiffness or soreness the next day.

Its two-part backrest also lends a unique look that at first appears a bit alien but is all the better for its uniqueness.

The chair comes in fabric or leather upholsteries. I've tried both and found they each have their unique appeal. The leather is supple and luxurious, while the fabric is soft and pleasant to touch while also being more breathable. The rear of the chair also features panels that can be removed and changed if you're looking for a change of pace. Natural wood tones are available for an elegant aesthetic, but there are also ESL-themed plates as well as some cybernetic variants if you're looking for something a little more fitting for a gaming setup.

It's also worth highlighting that Anthros was born from a team of wheelchair developers that saw a lack in the ergonomic seating industry when it comes to real biomechanics. In fact, there are practicing physical therapists on the team and have ensured that the mechanics of the chair align with the mechanics of the human body. This is where the pelvic support system was born, and it's always worth appreciating when real health science works to improve consumer products such as this.

Like most high-end chairs, it doesn't come cheap. But with a 12-year warranty, it's an investment that is well worth considering. Broken down over that time becomes far more reasonable when you consider the enhancement to your day and health.

Sihoo has been one of the brands to watch over the last couple years, and it's easy to see why. It has released some impressive chairs that challenge price points in everything from the budget sector to chairs that run well over $500.

As the saying goes, good things rarely come cheap. However, the M18 ergonomic office chair is an exception to that rule. At right around $150, it combines a breathable mesh back with a contoured waterfall edge fabric seat. It's a middle ground between full mesh and full fabric, allowing you to enjoy the softness of a real seat cushion with the breathability of mesh.

While there are certainly cheaper chairs out there, this is the best pick under $200 because of its design and adjustment options. It's a high-back chair with a natural lumbar-supporting curve. However, it also features a separate lumbar support that can be adjusted for both height and depth to ensure it matches your body. Tilt tension can be adjusted as well as armrest height. This allows it to meet your demands, whether you're typing at a keyboard or kicking back with a controller. It also includes an adjustable headrest, which makes this feel like an especially well-rounded option for its price point.

Of course, with affordability does come a few sacrifices. Unlike most of the chairs on this list, it comes with a three-year warranty, which isn't bad, but is a bit more limited than I like to see. The armrests are also only height adjustable, so you won't be able to angle them in if you need closer support for writing with a pencil and paper or texting on your phone.

So no, it’s not the absolute lowest cost chair but it’s one of the first options that actually provides the adjustments and support options necessary to see you through a full day with ease.

When I reviewed the Haworth Fern earlier this year, I was very impressed by how supportive, adjustable, and just plain comfortable it was. There is absolute substance behind its layers of style. The backrest has a contour that guides you toward its center and naturally supports the curvature of your spine. The internal leaves of the frond structure allow the backrest to move with your body, offering dynamic support alongside your movement. Put another way, it's a chair designed for real-world use, where you won't be sitting perfectly still all day.

It comes with many adjustments to ensure that it can be properly positioned to meet the needs of different body types. The lumbar support is optional; however, I would suggest to anyone considering this chair that they add it to their purchase for the added pinpoint support it’s able to provide. In addition, the seat can be adjusted for depth, enhancing comfort and ergonomics, and the armrests offer a wide range of positions for different postures.

The Fern is also available in an exceptionally wide range of colors and materials. It can be purchased in fabric, leather, or mesh, and there are even several Xbox-related variants if you want to show your console or Halo pride. In truth, I was quite surprised at how many options there were for styling. It's not uncommon to see plentiful customization options when you order directly from the manufacturer, but Haworth definitely goes above and beyond.

The Haworth Fern comes with a generous 12-year warranty to inspire confidence in its quality and the company’s long-term commitment to supporting your through any issues that might arise. It also helps to offset its large upfront cost, which is an understandable barrier to entry. If you can come up with that entry cost, however, you’ll be treated to one of the best-looking, most comfortable chairs available.

Steelcase has been making top-tier office furniture for more than, no joke, 100 years. The Amia has been a highly recommended choice since its introduction in 2010. Though it looks simple, it's exceptionally comfortable and promises to enhance the quality of your workday or long hours slaying enemies at your PC.

The big takeaway from my review earlier this year is that the Amia is a sleeper. Its mid-back fabric at first looks like any other office chair, but turn it around and you'll find an elegantly enclosed back, and you may even notice that it's more contoured than typical office chairs. Sit in it, and you'll find that its back support is simply leagues above the standard employer-issued seating most of us have grown used to.

Condensing that review down to just a few words: This chair is crazy comfortable. If it had a headrest or high-back version, it might just be my top pick on this list. The seat is deep and wide enough to accommodate a range of users and sitting styles. The backrest has a way of filling in all the nooks and crannies of your body's natural curvature, so you always feel supported.

While I wish it had a headrest or a taller version, this is mainly because I prefer to lean back and put my feet up when it's time to play a game with a controller. For normal work use, where you'll be sitting upright and typing at a keyboard, or gaming where you'll be doing the same, I didn't much miss its absence.

One thing I did miss, however, is any kind of angle lock. This chair allows you to adjust recline tension, but the only position it can be locked in is upright. Zero gravity seating just isn't an option with this chair.

Even so, it's well worth considering, especially if you're not ready to shell out over $1,000 for other options within Steelcase's lineup or other brands competing in the same space.

“A chair is a chair.” We've all heard a similar sentiment at some point in time, and though it's clearly an oversimplification (and flat out untrue), seats like the Hinomi H1 Pro absolutely blow this misconception out of the water.

Before testing it for myself, the company had already managed to catch my eye through its viral marketing campaigns – maybe it's because Facebook knew I was a guitar player, but I was well aware of its foldaway armrests well before I knew anything else about the chair or if it was even worth paying attention to. But it caught my attention, and I'm glad it did.

The H1 Pro is a full mesh chair designed to provide options and space savings in a way that virtually everything else simply does not. For example, when it comes to ergonomic adjustments, it offers just about everything you could ask for and more. The lumbar is adjustable to match your body, the seat depth shifted in and out, there's an angle and height adjustable headrest, tilt tension, tilt locking – all of these features are present and accounted for. At just over $600, you would expect as much. Though as I've monitored its pricing, it can often be found for closer to $550 if you keep an eye out for a sale.

But this is where things get interesting. You may have heard of 4D armrests, but have you heard of 5D? That's what the Hinomi H1 Pro offers. In addition to the typical height, depth, width, and angle adjustments, these armrests can also be moved up and entirely out of the way on their rotating arms. This is perfect if you are doing something where armrests might get in the way, such as playing guitar, or if you just prefer the freedom of not having a pair of arms surrounding you.

That's not the only fold-away part of the chair, however. Beneath the seat is a hidden footrest that slides out on a pair of bracketed arms and then folds outwards for added length and improved usability. It's padded and more comfortable than most other embedded footrests I've tested. Case in point: I actually used it when most others just get tucked away and forgotten after testing. When it’s not in use, it tucks completely away.

But that's not all. The H1 Pro's biggest party trick might be its most important if you live or work in a small space. When not in use, the backrest is able to fold completely down, allowing the chair to slide away underneath a desk. I found this especially useful in my office, which is always space constrained with boxes and products awaiting testing. It's a feature I wish more chairs had and is an absolute asset of the H1 Pro.

Steelcase is a formidable name in high-end office seating, and the Gesture is one of its most popular models. And that's for good reason. It's easily the most comfortable chair I've ever sat in, even against other Steelcase chairs and big competitors like Herman Miller. It offers a fantastic lumbar support (spring for the adjustable lumbar option... it's worth it) with a proprietary LiveBack structure so it flexes to match your movements. Its headrest is also the best in Steelcase's entire catalog.

As you would expect from a performance office chair, it's highly adjustable. Apart from the lumbar, you can also adjust the seat depth and height; tilt tension; the angle, height, and depth of the headrest; and the tilt limiter, which ranges from a full upright position to a deep recline for when you want to relax with several steps in between. Once I had it dialed in for my body, I genuinely wanted to sit more than I probably should have. It is truly that good.

It also comes with the best armrest I've ever encountered on an office chair. The arm supports use pivoting arms, not unlike an arm you might use for your gaming monitor. They can be positioned anywhere you like, from tight around your body to support your elbows while using your phone to low and wide so they're out of the way. They also offer the usual range of tilt, width, and depth adjusts on the armrests theselves. It's next level and completely worthy of all the praise it has received.

If you order it directly from the Steelcase site, you can choose the upholstery (fabric or leather), color, frame color scheme, whether to include lumbar support, and even if the wheels should be optimized for carpet or hard floor. With a 12-year warranty, a long track record of excellent support, and an eager secondary market ready to buy the chair if you swap out in the future, the Gesture is a chair you can buy with confidence.