The Kinder, Gentler, Cheaper Standing Desk
If you knew a simple way of extending your life by two years, would you do it? The question seems preposterous to all but those who are inclined to mug Charles Bronson late at night in a back alley. Well, standing is one of those simple acts. Studies have shown that people who sit less than three hours a day live, on average, two years longer than their bum-in-chair counterparts. Yet many of us with desk jobs frequently exceed three hours before lunchtime.
Of course, it’s not that we, the great seated masses, don’t care about our health: standing for long periods of time gets pretty arduous. A new Kickstarter project may have a solution for those of us looking to start standing up for better health and a longer life, but might not want to commit to standing all of the time.
The aptly named StandDesk is a variable height desk that allows you to raise it up to 45”, high enough to be a standing desk for someone up to 6’ 3” tall. Then when you get tired of standing, you can lower it to 28”, just lower than a standard table height. Going between those heights—and stopping anywhere in between—is as simple as pressing an up or down button. There is also an optional control panel with four buttons that allow you to set customized preset heights.
As is customary with Kickstarter, buying a StandDesk requires a pledge. A minimum pledge of $399 will get you a StandDesk; a price that includes a frame, laminate top, two-button control and motor, but not the cable management tray or shipping ($59 and $60-125, respectively). Prices go up from there depending on options: bamboo ply top, memory control panel, cable management tray. A fully optioned StandDesk will run you $649 (shipping extra).
None of this is as cheap as throwing a couple crates on your desk or buying an add-on like the Ergotron WorkFit (above, starting at $299). But the StandDesk is far more elegant and than those solutions, and, with a 225 lb payload, more rugged.
The StandDesk is considerably cheaper than other adjustable desks we’ve seen, like the Kinetic Desk (above top, $3890) or the X Table ($1500), which is the nicest looking of the bunch, but whose hand-crank might get tedious to operate after a while.