Are Gaming Chairs Worth It: The Gamer’s Guide
Gaming accessories are a dime a dozen. On the surface level, some are more essential than others. Better controllers, mice, and keyboards obviously improve your ability to play. Better headphones or speakers enhance your audio, while better monitors and screens enhance your visual enjoyment.
Still, does the chair you sit in affect how you play? Many companies would have you believe so.
On the cheaper end, you have chairs which by and large resemble normal-yet-comfortable office chairs. On the luxurious end, there are behemoths like the Zero Gravity Workstation Ultimate. At roughly $16,000, this high-end gaming chair costs as much as a used car.
Gaming chairs claim to do a lot — and have a price tag to match those claims. Below, we’re going to enter the fundamentals of what makes a gaming chair. From there, we’re going to see if they’re actually worth it.
Join WTFast as we explore the world of essential gaming accessories.
What Is a Gaming Chair?
In terms of form and function, the gaming chair is an evolution of the office chair. There are also multiple types of gaming chairs to know.
The standard PC gaming chair most directly resembles an office chair. These pieces have high arching backs meant to provide full-body support to make it easy to game for hours. They also have comfortable armrests, which are sometimes adjustable. They also usually swivel, have adjustable heights, and have wheels to allow for easy movement as needed.
Compare these to pedestal chairs: Unlike the standard gaming chair, these have a rounded pedestal base. This prevents moving the chair around the room, providing a more stable and grounded connection.
Rocker gaming chairs are usually simpler and more elegant in design. These are L-shaped pieces that either sit directly on the floor or have a small base. This allows for an easy, gentle rocking motion. They are great for home setups, but they aren’t as frequently seen on Twitch due to their height.
Some gaming chairs are built specifically for racing games. These may have built-in, responsive steering wheels to help simulate an arcade experience. They may also have haptics and other features meant to bring the feeling of arcade racers home.
The last type of chair to be aware of is the workstation gaming chair. These function as chair, desk, and monitor attachment all at once. Imperatorworks, the company behind the above-highlighted Scorpion chair, specializes in these. They tend to be the most expensive gaming chairs on the market, but they’re often the most stylish.
There are plenty of gaming chairs to meet the needs of any gamer. Still, the question remains: What are the actual benefits? Next up, we’ll look into the features that give gaming chairs long-lasting, continued popularity.
What Are the Benefits of a Gaming Chair?
The first benefit of a gaming chair is its level of comfort and support. Even for the most active gamer, gaming is essentially a sedentary activity. Many of us have experienced accidental soreness after sitting in an unhealthy position after a marathon session of gaming. Gaming chairs protect from this issue.
Gaming chairs offer lumbar support to take pressure off your back, joints, and muscles. However, getting into the proper posture is up to you. Gaming chairs generally support this by having more complex cushioning than many office chairs.
The second is the chair’s adjustability. Gaming chairs take the best of office chairs in that they allow for a personalized fit. Many have adjustable height, while others feature articulated armrests and more. This allows for a chair that is perfectly contoured to shape and uphold your body.
The third benefit is subjective based on user and chair — these accessories are simply stylish. The subtly reflective material of many chairs and often dark-inspired color palette simply look cool.
They can also be used to meet the needs of your space. L-shaped gaming chairs are perfect as a way to relax while enjoying playing console games on your TV. Office-style and pedestal chairs are great to keep you centered in front of your PC. Meanwhile, workstation chairs turn your desk and monitor setup into one cohesive unit.
The last benefit we’d like to highlight is that of special features. Many gaming chairs have built-in functions to do that which no other chair possibly can.
Racing chairs and arcade simulator chairs are great examples of this, due to the responsive feedback they give. Some chairs may even have onboard sound systems and speakers to further enhance the audio experience of gaming.
How Does Your Gaming Chair Affect Your Health?
Of these benefits, arguably the one with the most real impact is the one it has on your health. The way we sit has serious implications throughout our entire lives, not just when we game.
Improper sitting is associated with a variety of health issues. On the more minor end, this includes muscular discomfort. This can lead to long-term deformities of the musculoskeletal system.
Research suggests that office chairs designed to specifically combat these issues can help prevent or reduce these risks. The same holds true for gaming chairs, which are also designed to tackle these issues.
Sitting for prolonged periods of time also has its own associated issues. These include heart disease, dementia, and even shortened lifespan. However, between daily work, gaming when you can, and consuming other media, sitting is an ingrained way of life. The least we can do in these situations is to take heed of the chair we’re sitting in.
After shelling out money to improve your gaming systems, library, and accessories, it can be tempting to be thrifty with chairs. However, this is one area where you shouldn’t cut corners. A good chair will last you for years. You should be sure to get one that supports you.
What Are the Drawbacks of Gaming Chairs?
Gaming chairs are awesome in a lot of ways, and they have potential positive health and enjoyment benefits when we use them. Still, this doesn’t mean that they’re perfect. There are a variety of issues when it comes to gaming chairs. These both include style-wise drawbacks and general gamer complaints.
One of the biggest critiques is comfort in regard to seating and adjustability. The only way to really know how you’ll like a chair is to test it out yourself. Unfortunately, most gaming chairs are not going to be targeting in-store sales. If you can find a brick-and-mortar store selling gaming chairs, this can help boost your long-term satisfaction.
Gaming chairs are also expensive. Furniture, in general, is expensive, but gaming chairs can present some particular fiscal challenges. You can easily spend a few hundred on your build, and for the most specialized chairs, even a few thousand isn’t unheard of. Rocker-style chairs tend to be the cheapest, with workstation chairs being among the most expensive.
Gaming chairs purport to be special when it comes to ergonomics. However, ergonomics means more than just the chair you have. It requires study into all the ways your work impacts you to prevent musculoskeletal disorders, including hand movements, and more. It’s complex, and gaming chairs aren’t the end-all to all gaming problems, even if they’re significantly helpful.
The best way to make sure you’ll enjoy the chair you have is to find somewhere to test it out beforehand. This way, you can tell if you’ll be satisfied with your purchase.
Do You Need a Gaming Chair?
The biggest question of whether gaming chairs are necessary is if you need a chair with the gaming chair label. As stated before, gaming chairs are an evolution of an existing, and predominant style of chair. The overwhelming majority of office chairs won’t have onboard speakers, but they can still offer lumbar support and long-term durability.
Are gaming chairs worth it? It depends. If you want the best experience and can justify the investment, racing and workstation chairs can transform your gaming. Most gamers probably can’t fully justify spending four figures on a chair, however, let alone five.
Return-on-investment is also an issue. Improving your speed when playing your favorite games can usually be felt. A comfortable chair, going beyond a certain point, may have lower perceptible differences.
You should get a chair that’s built to offer lumbar support, and is adjustable to your comfort levels. This doesn’t necessarily have to be a“gaming chair, however. A nice office chair — from executive seats to iconic swivel designs — is readily accessible online and in stores. It may be that you get more mileage out of these without paying for the title of gaming chair.
Gaming chairs can be worth it, but office chairs offer the same experience for many gamers.
Other Ways to Boost Your Setup
Your chair is just one factor that contributes to your setup. If you enjoyed this thoughtful guide, we’d like to invite you to check out other WTFast offerings.
We provide tech guides on everything from keyboards to individual chipsets. WTFast is proud to offer expert guidance on all tech comparisons and online gaming needs.
Sources:
Average Used Car Cost $29,000 in November, up 28% since 2020 I CNET
Ergonomics - Overview | Occupational Safety and Health Administration
