Leap

1/14/2021 Update: I've had this chair now for several months. In the beginning it was not comfortable but that changed. For all the sitting I do while working at home I do not have back issues. I like the ability to recline to stretch out my back throughout the day. Overall I am satisfied with this purchase. 9/30 Update: In hindsight I probably would not spend the money to purchase this chair. I was fortunate that my employer subsidized the cost. I do still have back pain, not as much as the previous chair but it's still there. Based on online reviews of this chair on the Internet I would have thought this would be the most comfortable chair I could sit in but it is not and for the money I would expect that it would be. Original review: I decided to spend the additional funds to purchase this chair because I did not have a positive experience with lower priced office chairs. Based on my research I discovered that this is one of the top office chairs on the market. It has lived up to its reputation. It came assembled which was great because I didn't have to worry about not screws that did not fit properly into their holes. I'm very pleased and it's worth it now that I am working at home and require a very high quality chair....my back is worth it!!

Disclosure: I purchased this chair 2 months ago. I've been using it every weekday from about 9am to about 6pm. I get up for lunch and the occasional errand. However, I spend at least 6-7 full hours on the chair each day. After spending a year on a cheap desk chair (~$100) and dealing with pain in my legs and back I finally had enough and started researching the best chairs. I came across Steelcase and eventually settled on the Leap chair as my next chair. I thought about buying it from Steelcase directly, however, their online shop isn't too user friendly and I would have had to wait at least 3 weeks for it to arrive. With Amazon, it was going to arrive between 5-7 days since they had it in their warehouse. The Leap chair arrived fully assembled (the packaging was actually quite impressive!). This chair has several settings so that you can customize it to your height and size and make it feel just right. The one I got came with the carpet casters, however, they work great on my hard floor. They glide smoothly and comfortably. FYI - I weigh about 170lbs. I have a feeling this is a chair I'll have for at least a few more years. I highly recommend it. After this chair I will never go back to cheaper desk chairs.

The chair itself is fine, but apart incredibly cheap feeling fabric for a chair of this price, it creaks and groans relentlessly despite being putatively brand-new and not refurbished. This certainly does not feel like a $1,300 chair––the value is not there for the money. The good news is, apart from it being delivered fully assembled, and providing good back support, it is free and easy to return.

My office has had lots of Steelcase Leap chairs for years, so I am very familiar with them. Many years ago, we tested several quality office chairs, and the Leap got my vote over all the others. At the start of the pandemic, like many others, I started working from home almost exclusively. I bought a cheap $150 office chair at the time and suffered through the discomfort and back problems that came with it. More recently, I tried "upgrading" to a $300 office chair, which proved to be even worse, giving me a consistent neck ache due to poor posture that was impossible to correct. I looked at a lot of different options but kept coming back to the conclusion that anything less than a Leap would just mean a new set of problems. There are so many aspects of a chair that can go wrong -- lumbar support that is too far forward or non-adjustable, useless neck supports, uncomfortable arm supports stuck in place, hard seats, seat backs that don't come up far enough to sit straight, crappy wheels, the list goes on and I simply don't feel confident being able to judge all of those things especially while looking at chairs online given my experiences thus far. Even when I have tried to test them in-store, I have ended up with problems I didn't anticipate until I was actually using the chair over a period of time. The Leap is excellent in every respect. The cost is definitely high to pay out of your own funds for a home office, but the way I see it now, if you sit all day for your job, you can either pay the cost of that in the form of a nice office chair, or in the form of lots of visits to the doctor/physical therapist/chiropractor/etc. (been there, done that). Do yourself a favor and spend the money preventing those problems instead.

This is an excellent quality chair, with a few issues. I read some other reviews which said that the boxing of the product was horrible, but that was not my case. When i received the chair it was in a large box which was nestled in another box in the other direction so that the entire chair was enclosed. It was taped shut and I felt that it was well packaged. They may have changed how they package their product based on the former poor reviews on that. The tag on the bottom of the seat states that the chair was manufactured in 2000 (and I assume was sold either that year or the one after). It is currently 2016 so it is about a 16 year old chair. They must have changed the upholstery and armrests on it because it seems in new condition. There are no visible scratches on the plastic parts, so they either replaced those as well or it was just really well taken care of. The only visible sign of use is underneath the armrests. The armrests on these can slide in toward the body and underneath those armrests are instructions on how to use the various adjustments. It is white print on a black plastic background. The print is faded and barely visible but I can still see them well enough to know how to make adjustments on my chair. But it shows me that this chair belonged to someone for quite some time. In all, the chair appears to look newish other than the white print issue I just mentioned. It also appears to be sturdily built and I feel confidence that whatever repairs they made it should last me quite a few years. At first I was alarmed because the chair made a distinctive clicking sound when I leaned back in it. I realized later that it was because of a piece of plastic on the bottom which does not seem to serve much purpose. I am guessing it is a dust guard of some sort? I was tempted to cut it off, but wound up leaving it because after I bent it down and out of the way it stayed down and I haven't had any noise issues since then. The only other noise issue I have had is with the armrests. When I pulled the armrests in toward my body it would give a small squeak on both sides. I added some wd 40 and that seems to have stopped it for the most part. Every now and then I still get a squeak so I'll probably have to do it again and figure out where I missed. (I should note that while I was sorting out my clicking noise issue I was in contact with customer support and they were very responsive and emailed me on the same day I emailed them, so I was left with a confident feeling they would handle any issues that might come up. Fortunately it didn't have to go any further than that.) One of my favorite things about this chair is how highly adjustable it is. I can change the seat height. I can move the seat under me forwards and back. The armrests pull in toward my body at any angle I wish. The front of the armrests can tilt in or the back can tilt in or both armrests can pull in toward me parallel with each other. This gives me unexpected support for my arms while I am typing and I love it. A slight disappointment is that the armrests adjust up and down at certain predetermined heights. It would have been nicer if they could adjust to any height but it was probably cheaper to have them click in to set heights. A minor quibble since it mostly works. I am 5 ft 6 in and it gives me plenty of of range in height so that I can get a perfect 90 degree angle on my legs or flex upwards or down as I wish. But the feature I love the most is how the back of the chair adjusts. There is a knob which adjusts tension and on that nob is a lever which can move to 4 different positions. The first position will not let the back of the chair flex backward at all. It pretty much locks you it to one spot. There is the barest amount of backward flex but not much. And it is not so rigidly straight up and down that you will feel uncomfortable. It feels good to me, but I prefer having some flex in how I sit so I don't have it adjusted like that. Each of the other positions on that lever will allow you to flex the back of the chair further backwards. The furthest position is perhaps at a 120 - 125 degree angle. Not so far back you feel you could sleep in the chair, but far back enough to give a laid back feel to the position. The knob adjustment changes the amount of tension in the back so that it takes more pressure or less to push the chair into various degrees of angle. I LOVE this. I can push backward at just the right amount of pressure for me into a new backward angle, and then the chair holds me in that position without any effort on my part. If I feel I am tired of that angle I can shift to another angle by sitting up or pushing back, and again it holds me in that new position effortlessly. Absolutely awesome and I can't believe all chairs aren't made this way. Price - I paid $344 for the refurbished chair and I feel it is an incredible deal at this price. If I had paid full price, however, I probably would have been disappointed because I don't feel the value is worth what I would likely have paid. Why not? Well, it has a few issues. First is the fabric on the chair is a bit scratchy, so if you are sitting in shorts or a tank top and you get the fabric version of this chair it will feel like sitting on a wool blanket. Not horrible, but not great either. For all I know the fabric probably is wool, which is great from a durability perspective. But not awesome from a comfort perspective. I wound up pulling a black cotton t-shirt over the back and I am ordering a pad to go on the bottom so that should eradicate that issue for me. Which brings me to my second point which is that the padding in the seat is not anywhere deep enough for me. Obviously this is going to differ from person to person but the padding seems to be not much deeper than what you might find on most office chairs. Actually, I think I've sat in a few cheap office chairs that had deeper padding. This is unacceptable for such an expensive chair in my opinion and is the biggest reason why I've docked a star. I am a writer, and I am planning on sitting for long hours in this chair. I need some serious padding in order to sit for such long hours. I wound up finding a seat pad which was pretty spendy but is designed with a gel criss-cross design created to eradicate pressure points. Hopefully this will allow me to sit for long periods.The pad I purchased I got through Amazon and the brand is called Miracle Cushion in case anyone cares. I also purchased their lumbar pillow made from the same material which leads me to the next point which is lack of lumbar support. Obviously the amount of lumbar support a person needs is going to vary greatly so it would be hard for a company to add this, which is why I didn't dock any stars for this. But I never realized how much lumbar support I needed until I sat in this chair. I think a big part of it is that although the back tilting backwards and forwards is a fantastic feature, if you need lumbar support it will become even more obvious when your lower back is exposed in a tilted back position. This chair really doesn't seem to have much lumbar support at all even though the back of the chair does curve a bit. When I add a rolled up towel to my lower back it feels tons better, so I think the pillow and pad I ordered are all I will need. There are chairs made that have lumbar support added in, so this may be something you might want to consider if that is important to you. There was also a comment by another reviewer that said that she has a wide bottom and she could feel hard plastic on either side of her butt which made it uncomfortable. I would agree that this could be the case for someone who is heavier. I am 5 ft 6 and around 235 lbs. If I am standing straight up with 7 inches of distance between my feet, the widest part of my hips measure in at a little over 46 inches. So I am not a small woman. When I sit in this chair I barely feel the plastic on either side of me. I have stopped noticing it so it is a non-issue for me, but if you have a wide bottom, this chair is probably not for you. The reason this plastic is there is to encase the framework that can bring the armrests in close to your body. I think this is a decent trade off for having a narrower seat. I noted that other reviewers were talking about which version they received, version 1 or 2. I assume V1 is the low backed version and that may be the one I got. The seat I got has a back that comes up to my shoulders, which is much higher than I was expecting. Per the picture I was expecting a low backed chair. I assume the V2 comes up higher than someone's head. I am more than pleased with the height of the seat back. All in all, I think this is a solid chair. I think the fact that it lasted 16 years before it got sent back is a testament to the type of quality build it has. I think the good customer support indicates it probably isn't a risk to buy it since they will likely make any issue right if there is an issue.It's probably wise to keep your box in case you do need to ship it back. I think that, like all chairs, different people are going to like different types of chairs and it is ideal if you sit in one for a while if you can. I personally don't live anywhere close to somewhere which would carry high end chairs like this so I kind of had to take a chance. But I think, after the adjustments I will make to it, I am guessing it will likely turn into a perfect sitting situation for me. Hopefully this review was helpful for you in making your choice. Good luck!

Been using for several months now. I initially sat down and thought I made a huge mistake, it's not like sitting on a comfy chair. I knew the return window would allow to to send back figured I'd sit in it for a few days. I'm 6'1 170lbs, WFH, roughly 9-10 hours a day spent in the chair. Initial impression was that my lower back didn't like the lumbar support at all, took it out (30 seconds total to remove) and noticed relief right away but it still didn't feel great after the first day, my entire body actually hurt. I was researching how to send it back from the couch that evening. Played with the settings and after the second day I still didn't like it at all. The third or 4th day I noticed my posture had started to improve due to the arm rests adjustability giving you many different seating options. I'd never used a recline function in any chair so I immediately shut it off. Decided to try it out and couldn't believe how great the ability to sit upright firm with stability so it doesn't fall back, then slightly recline if needed, I now use it all day without thinking about it. By the end of the first week I started breaking the box it came in down because there was no way I could ever see myself sitting in any other chair. I'm amazed at what this has done for my overall comfort even life outside of the chair. This was easily the best purchase I can recall making. I just wish I had done it sooner. The build quality is what you would expect when you're paying a lot. There's not a ton of padding (seems to be most higher end chairs), but it's an incredibly comfortable chair once you get used to it. I expect this chair to last a very long time, however, if I ever get wind they're discontinuing this chair or redesigning it, I'll be buying a backup V2 for sure.

As soon as I sat on this chair, I knew it was "the one". Love at first sight but for a piece of furniture :) The first thing I noticed about it was that it's actually smaller than a lot of the "executive" high-back chairs I've sat on. Those were very uncomfortable, and not designed for people of my size (I'm 5 ft 8, 140 lbs). Here are the most important design features for me: 1) The seat is depth-adjustable. I have relatively short thighs. I like that I can adjust the seat so that my back is nestled against the seat back and my legs still fall off the seat front at a right angle. 2) The arms are adjustable and yet not too loose: I thought this would not be a big deal, but this is turning out to be one of my favorite features. The arms can be lowered so you can pull the chair right up under the desk allowing you to get closer to your computer, if you want. They can be raised if you need support for your elbows. My old chair had arm rests that were far too wide basically making them useless. 3) There is a bewildering array of levers to adjust the chair and I thought this would be intimidating. However, every knob and lever is actually labeled so you know exactly what it does. Within a few minutes I knew how to adjust my chair. 4) I don't like mesh back chairs so I chose the Steelcase Leap over chairs like the Aeron. If you are spending an absurd amount of time in front of a computer because of working from home, do yourself a favor and buy a decent chair. Your body will thank you for it. The Steelcase Leap is expensive (when new, it's over $900) but I bought mine used and refurbished from TE Seating, at Amazon Marketplace. They delivered the chair within a week, fully assembled. It comes in a large box and it's very heavy so bear that in mind - you may need someone to help you bring it inside.

I am an avid gamer and can sometimes sit in a chair for more than 4 hours on end, this chair was great as I did not experience any back pain or circulation problems in my limbs. The chair is extremely heavy which addds to it's sturdiness, so expect that it will make large dents in carpeted floor, so you should buy the optional casters for carpet if you can. Highly adjustable arms, lumbar support, inclining option, and elevation. My back and bottom stay cool on the pads even in the summer so the material that the seat is made out of is very breathable. Great chair and great product, it's a high price, but worth every penny for my back health and comfort.