Best office chairs in 2023

Are you looking for the best office chair to save your posture and make life more comfortable? As a man who drives a desk far more than I should, I’ve sorted through the myriad options out there to help you find the best chair for your body type at a range of prices.

Whether you’re sitting down to work hard or play the best PC games, comfort is always the name of the game. The best gaming chairs often have a very specific look, so this list is home to some more subtle designs. Of course, office and gaming chairs do have more crossover nowadays, so some options that could feasibly be both.

I chose the best office chairs in this guide for their comfort levels, support, and design. The Herman Miller Embody is undoubtedly the best premium choice, thanks to the company’s years of research. But affordable options like the Vertagear PL1000 will serve your spine well, too.

When choosing the best office chair for gaming, work out what your usage is in terms of hours, how much you want to spend, and your own physical dimensions (there’s no benefit to being too small or big in an office chair). Then, take a seat and look through these options…

The best office chairs for gaming in 2023:

1. AutoFull C3 – best heavyweight option
2. Herman Miller Embody – best premium office chair
3. Vertagear PL1000 – most colorful option
4. Razer Izkur X – best office gaming chair
5. Secretlab TITAN Evo XL – best for larger people
6. Boulies Elite 2024 – most comfortable option
7. Boulies Master 2024 – best for lumbar support

1. AutoFull C3

The best heavyweight office gaming chair.

AutoFull C3 specs:

Pros

• Solidly built
• Hugely adjustable

Cons

• No flaws found

A true combo of office and gaming chair, the AutoFull C3 is nothing if not a proper seat of power for your posterior. Crafted from premium leather and carbon fiber on an all-steel frame filled with high-density foam, this nimble tank of a chair can recline between 90°-165° and comes complete with a footrest to provide the ultimate at-desk comfort.

Adding to that essential sense of seating satisfaction is a memory foam lumbar cushion to keep your spine in the perfect position and keep you from ending up hideously hunched over like some frightful beast from Baldur’s Gate 3, while the nicely padded armrests move up and down and left to right so that your arms are always where you need them to be.

With a recommended max weight of 150kg (330lbs) and a class-4 gas lift, the C3 can handle gamers with a fuller figure, so no matter how much pizza you polish off when you play, the AutoFull, literally, has your back.

Available in Black, Brown, or Gray, the AutoFull C3 looks good and feels fantastic whether you’re fighting off demonic hordes, furiously finishing off an assignment, or just catching 40 winks.

2. Herman Miller Embody x Logitech

The best office chair if money is no object.

Herman Miller Embody specs:

Pros

• Best for comfort and posture
• 12-year, 24-hour usage warranty
• Backed by scientific research

Cons

• Very expensive
• Availability can vary

The Herman Miller X Logitech G Embody gaming chair combines two titan brands to create the most comfortable and well-designed chair we could hope to include on this list. Taking the design of the original Herman Miller Embody office chair – with science-backed lumbar support – this Logitech version comes in several fun colorways, including lilac and white.

There’s more to this partnership than just new fabrics, though. Herman Miller has enhanced the chair’s original design by taking into account how gamers sit. That means there’s extra padding in the seat to support an upright posture, as well as copper-infused cooling foam to prevent heat from building up as you play for longer periods.

The build quality of Herman Miller products is always premium (which you’d expect for the price), and the Embody has molded foam armrests, an aluminum base, and carpet and hard floor wheels so it’s suitable for any surface you want to roll on.

It’s the most expensive office chair here, but given how long many of us sit down at our desks to work or game, we think it’s a worthy investment if your budget will stretch. It gets a 4.4 out of 5 stars from over 600 reviews on the official Herman Miller website, with many saying it’s the only gaming chair they’ll ever need. Thanks to its 12-year warranty, it could well be.

3. Vertagear PL1000

The best office gaming chair for color.

Vertagear PL1000 specs:

Pros

• Easy to construct
• Very flexible

Cons

• Armrests feel too plasticky

Seen here in its very latest Pink and White finish iteration, the Vertagear PL1000 was one of the first office/gaming chairs I tested from Vertagear earlier in 2023, back before this distinctly doll-influenced option was unveiled in May. But if Barbie’s not your bag, it also comes in six other colorways that are far more understated, so don’t avert your attention yet.

Color aside, what we have in the pleasing shape of the PL1000 is one very well-conceived chair that not only takes a mere 15-20 minutes to put together but which bends every which way to keep you in the faux leather lap of comfort. Indeed, capable of reclining by 140°, everything about this chair can be adjusted, such as seat height, depth, armrests, lumbar support, and neck pillow, to bespoke-base every element around your body.

Beneath that aforementioned PVC and PU faux-leather sits Ultra-Premium High-Resiliency (UPHR) foam, which sculpts itself to the specific aspects of your, well, ass to ensure absolute amenity, while the class-4 gas lift, soft-coated Penta RS1 casters, and metal5-star base make it light work to move about.

A high-quality option at a surprisingly low price, the Vertagear PL1000 will keep your posture perfect regardless of how long your sedentary sitting time is.

4. Razer Iskur X

The best office gaming chair.

Razer Iskur X specs:

Pros

• Incredibly comfortable
• 4D arms

Cons

• Bit pricey

A name spoken in revered whispers by gaming and esports fans the globe over, Razer knows a thing or two when it comes to making the gaming gear that matters. Whether it’s hardware or software to enhance the electronic experience way above the average, or something seemingly a bit more simple, Razer has every element covered. This brings us neatly to this, a different kind of ‘software’ that the Big R has exactingly engineered to keep you in the game, the Iskur X.

Named after either a Bulgarian river OR a Mesopotamian god of storms (I’m guessing the latter), this stunning seat features an ergonomic lumbar support system and high-density foam cushions so hardcore gamers and core harder for even longer, 4D armrests take tailored support to a whole new level.

Finished in black multi-layered synthetic leather (PVC) and stitching in Razer’s distinctive green livery, beneath the skin a plywood frame is reinforced by steel to keep the whole shebang rock-solid, while a steel-reinforced wheelbase, add to the Iskur X’s ability to house gamers of up to 136kg (299lbs) in complete comfort for stupidly prolonged periods of play. And that’s the Razer Iskur X: less a chair, more a throne of games.

5. Secretlab Titan Evo 2022

The XL is the best office chair for heavyweights

Scretlab Titan Evo 2022 specs:

Pros

• High quality build
• Loads of designs
• Different sizes for different people

Cons

• Expensive
• Even more expensive if you customize

The TITAN Evo from Secretlabs comes in three size flavors: Small, Regular, and XL. Still, for the sake of this round-up, I’ve decided to focus on the big boy of the triumvirate seeing as gamers come in all shapes and sizes, and not every chair option out there is designed to deal with those of us of a higher or heftier build.

If that includes you, then forget the rest and rest your forget in this. Capable of coping with those up to 6’9” tall and/or weighing in at up to 396lbs, this absolute armchair comes packing the world’s most advanced four-way lumbar support system (and if you’ve never had a four-way, you don’t know what you’ve been missing), along with a magnetic memory foam head pillow, full-metal 4D armrests, complete recline and tilt adjustability, and a proprietary sculpted pebble seat base, all draped in your choice of Secretlab NEO Hybrid Leatherette, SoftWeave Plus fabric, NAPA leather, or official Lamborghini ‘Exotic’, with a variety of colorways available to boot.

Built for battle, this is a seat sculpted specifically for gaming giants, and once both your back and backside have experienced its myriad modes of personal maneuverability you’ll never settle for anything else.

6. Boulies Elite 2024

The best office gaming chair for comfort.

Boulies Elite 2024 specs:

Pros

• Waterproof
• Headrest pillow and lumbar cushion included

Cons

• Quite sizeable

I’m a fan of Boulies’ chairs; in fact, I’m sitting in one right now. Designed to offer all-over support in keeping with the silly design of the average human, they keep all bodily bases covered.

The new Boulies Elite 2024 extends that courtesy, being a chair for work, rest and play that features a backrest mimicking the natural curvature of the human spine, eight-way adjustable soft armrests, a smooth reclining mechanism, and a multi-tilt mechanism with height adjustment, rocking tilt switch and tilt tension adjustment. So, yes, you can shape the chair around you like some bespoke sitting-in suit.

With XL PU casters bringing up the bottom, movement in all directions is easy, and the class-4 gas lift means your ups and downs won’t suffer any ups and downs. Upholstered in Ultraflex PU leather, infused with sports car-inspired microfiber suede (available in Black, White or Blue), the Elite 2024 is water-repellent too, which is an absolute must for the kind of slobs, me most definitely included, who remorselessly eat, drink and spill at their gaming stations.

An excellent and affordable option for better treatment of your back and buttocks, ease into the Elite from Boulies. Find more of the most comfortable gaming chairs in our guide.

7. Boulies Master 2024

The best office gaming chair for lumbar support.

Boulies Elite 2024 specs:

Pros

• Fine-tune lumbar support
• Aluminum 4D Armrests

Cons

• Nothing to report

My second pick from within the great playing seat pantheon of Boulies, the Master 2024 launched this very month and, as such, has that ‘new baby/car’ smell all over it. Available in Ultraflex PVC or a water-repellent fabric, and Black, Blue, or Brown finishes, the Master has been produced by the powers that be to hug every curve of your carcass to provide you with the ultimate in quality, comfort, and support whether home working like a trooper put on triple pay or simply dying your dread-filled way through Dead Space.

Ergonomic in the extreme with smooth curves, contoured cushions, and customizable integrated lumbar support, the chair can be fully adjusted to fit perfectly around you like a gluteus maximus glove.

With an extra strong steel frame, aluminum base, no fewer than six soft-touch casters, multi-tilt mechanism, and the standard-at-this-quality class-4 gas lift, the Boulies Master 2024 is always ready to roll, tilt and recline whenever you are, wrapping your body in a bespoke chair shell of 100% comfort-ensuring cold-cure foam.

Pure class for your, ahem, ass, the new Boulies Master 2024 is the ideal office gaming chair for the most demanding of derrières.

How to choose the best office chair

That’s our selection of seating solutions for those whose lives are desk-dominated, be that working, gaming, or some kind of happy hybrid. But what chair best suits you depends on a variety of factors, mainly based on your size, weight, and budget.

Once you’ve chosen your chair, spend some real time playing with it to properly adjust it to your proportions. Get that right, and the rest will see you sitting pretty.

To reduce the amount of time you spend sitting down, check out the best standing desks for gaming.