The standard American office chair is way too big for most of us. I’m 6’3″ tall and I weigh 195 pounds. The average chairs fit is even too big for me, despite the ability to adjust height and width. Not only is it too big, using armrests ended up causing dysfunction in my neck and shoulder. Using poor armrest posture caused an excessive amount of tight muscles and inflamed tendons. These repetitive strain injuries took a very long time to fix. Today, I’m dedicating this article to explain how to make office chair armrests more comfortable.
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How to Adjust Office Chair Armrests
Nothing on my website is professional medical advice. It’s for educational purposes only. I share my experience, what has worked for me, and what hasn’t. I talk about the poor posture mistakes I’ve fixed and the good posture habits I’ve learned. You are your primary caretaker. Do your research and make good decisions. Be the best advocate possible for your own healthcare and computer posture. Even when it’s related to armrests height. Both height and width of office chair armrests have posed poor posture mistakes for me in the past.
Why Office Chair Armrests Don’t Work for Me
This article will cover the proper armrest height for office chairs. But first, let’s talk about how adjusting office chair armrests isn’t always the solution. If the armrest won’t adjust correctly, I’d rather leave my elbow suspended in air, rather than break my good computer posture to rest it in a compromised position.
Non-adjusting office chair armrests
Not all desk chair armrests are height adjustable. When this is the case, the armrest height is almost always incorrect for me. No chair manufacturer is going to make a permanent armrest that is made for someone 6’3″ tall.
The armrests height was incorrect.
Some armrests are height adjustable. However, that doesn’t mean that it’s always healthy for us to rest our elbows on them. It’s very rare to adjust the armrests on a chair so the elbow height is correct. It’s important to me that my elbow is never below the desk level. I used to make this poor computer posture mistake often. When I had my elbow below desk level, it would cause me to lift my hands onto the keyboard and mouse by contracting my biceps.
Holding my biceps in this position for long periods of time caused painful overuse injuries in multiple tendons. I wrote an article about it specifically, titled “How to Sit at Your Desk to Relieve Shoulder Pain.” You can find it here if you’d like. The main variable I always make sure of is to keep my elbow at desk level, or slightly higher, regardless if I’m able to rest it on an armrest or not. This allows me to take some of the burden off my biceps, equaling the anterior and posterior muscle activation in my upper arms, by activating a little more of the triceps.
The width adjustability doesn’t get narrow enough.
Most office chair armrests don’t have an option for width adjustability at all. This lack of width adjustability caused me to break my good posture at the shoulders. Once I broke my posture at one joint, it caused a chain reaction with other muscles, tendons, and joints. It pulled my entire body out of alignment. When our body is in the same, poor posture for an extended period of time, it creates overuse injuries and stubborn muscle confusion.
In order to rest my elbows on the armrests, I would overextend my upper arms downward. This would overextend my biceps and triceps for long periods of time. My overextended biceps became deactivated. Those tight, deactivated muscles didn’t stop in my biceps. They caused a chain reaction both north and south outside of my upper arms. South, through the tendons in my elbow (causing tendonitis) and also into my forearm muscles (weakening them). North, from my biceps through my shoulder (causing internal shoulder rotation). It went from there, into my chest and up to my collarbone. Resting my elbows on the armrests, at incorrect elbow height, also caused painful repetitive strain injuries in my neck, especially the scalenes and that’s one of the reasons why office chair armrests don’t work for me.
The seat depth was too deep.
We need to make sure our back is supported while sitting on the chair. We can do this by resting our upper body on the chair’s backrest. However, most ergonomic chairs have a seat depth that is way too deep for us. If we sit all the way back in the chair against the backrest, it often creates another problem. This makes us have to slide part of the chair under the desk in order to comfortably reach our keyboard and mouse. Sometimes, the armrests height causes the armrests to hit the desk.
Even though we are taking advantage of the backrest, the chair armrests hit the desk so we can’t reach the keyboard and mouse without overextending our upper arms. This caused a lot of overuse injuries in my biceps, triceps, neck and shoulder. Looking back, I wish I could remove the armrests from the chair. This way, the chair would’ve slid under the desk, allowing me to comfortably reach my keyboard and mouse. I’d rather work without armrests, as long as my elbow height is correct.
Steps on How to Adjust Office Chair Armrests
In the above situations, we may have to avoid using office chair armrests altogether. I’d rather work without armrests if they are only going to cause overextension in my upper arms, neck and shoulder. But let’s assume that the armrests will get in the correct position.
Each computer user and desk setup has many different variables. It would be impossible to write a one-size-fits-all solution to the problems that office chair armrests cause. However, I’ve written some desk chair armrest adjustment instructions below. If your armrests won’t adjust to this position, I’d be sure to maintain good computer posture while not using the armrests.
Rule #1: Always keep your elbows close to a 90 degree angle (to maintain proper armrest height for office chair).
How high should office chair armrests be?
When ergonomically adjusting chair armrests, your forearms should be parallel to the floor (regardless if they are resting on an armrest or not). If your forearms aren’t exactly parallel to the floor, I think this is okay too. As long as your elbow is never below your keyboard and mouse height. This would cause overuse and tension of the bicep muscles. This led to a lot of pain in my elbow, neck and shoulder. This is a very important variable of ergonomic office chair armrest positioning.
Rule #2: Shoulders are back, down, relaxed, and balanced. Keep your elbows somewhat close to your rib cage (not extended out away from your sides).
Your elbows don’t have to be touching your rib cage. But, your upper arms should go almost straight down towards the floor from your shoulder to your elbow (not out to your side). You shouldn’t have to use any of your upper arm muscles just to rest your elbow on an armrest. That defeats the purpose and just causes other problems. I’d just assume not use armrests at all. Extending your elbows outwards away from your body laterally, even a fraction of an inch, could cause stubborn muscle tension and chronic pain.
If I can’t get my office chair armrests in the position described by the 2 rules above, I will not use them. But, I will still make sure to keep my elbows in these positions while they are suspended in the air. This is proper elbow placement while working at a computer, regardless if I’m using the armrests or not.
There are so many different variables involved with good computer posture. There is no one-size-fits-all solution for everyone. We all have to increase our own body awareness and adjust accordingly.
Thanks for your interest in sitting posture. If you’ve read this far, congratulations! You’re taking valuable steps to reduce pain and improve computer posture. That’s something to be proud of.
If you liked this article on office chair armrest adjustment, check out my book titled “45 Ways to Improve Computer Posture.” It’s available in both digital and paperback versions.
>>> Click here to pick up your copy
Knowing how to adjust office chair armrests is a great way to start improving your computer posture. This book explains how to improve your posture through different variables of health and wellness. These include sitting posture, standing posture, sleep, hydration, and breathing. Poor posture is not just how we sit at a computer. The health habits we practice, 24 hours a day, are directly related to how good (or bad) our computer posture is.
Go to SittingPosture.com/book to learn more.
Take care,
Todd Bowen
P.S. You can sign up for my free computer posture newsletter here.