Branch Ergonomic Chair Pro, Mesh Office Chair with 14 Points of Adjustment

Why it's worth it

The Branch Ergonomic Chair Pro gives you 14 adjustment points, including 5D armrests and a lumbar cushion that slides up and down your back. That's the kind of fine-tuning that usually shows up on chairs several times the cost, and it's why this is the first thing we'd buy.

A chair is the one purchase that compounds. Every other upgrade here makes a workday nicer. This one decides how your neck and lower back feel in three years. Owners who came from a cheap big-box chair describe shoulder and back pain fading within weeks, and that pattern shows up over and over in feedback on this chair. You sit in it forty hours a week. Nothing else on your desk gets that much contact time.

The adjustment count isn't marketing padding. The armrests move in five directions — height, width, depth, pivot and pad position — so you can park your forearms level with your keyboard instead of shrugging into them. The lumbar cushion moves vertically, which matters because the small of your back isn't in the same place as your coworker's. Most chairs in this range give you a fixed bump and call it lumbar support.

From our review of 8 work-from-home upgrades, by Laura Cole, Lifestyle Editor

What we like

• +A chair is the one purchase that compounds
• +The adjustment count isn't marketing padding
• +It's built like furniture, not like a task chair
• +It's the chair to buy if you're tall-average and not sure what you need

What to know

• –The seat runs deep. Shorter and slimmer people report the front edge pressing into the backs of their knees even with the depth…
• –It isn't cheap for what people expect a home chair to cost, and some owners feel the seat cushion doesn't quite match the rest…