Should My Home Office Chair Have Wheels?

Should My Home Office Chair Have Wheels?

In most modern offices, office chairs have wheels but does your home office chair need to be a wheeled chair?

Or can you safely opt for a chair without wheels?

We talked to experts in ergonomic chairs and this is what they told us that you need to know.


Why Most Office Chairs Have Wheels

There are good reasons that most office chairs do have wheels. A wheeled office chair brings certain advantages over a chair without wheels.


Office Chairs With Wheels Have More Mobility

Office Chairs With Wheels

Firstly, this might seem pretty obvious but rolling chairs are more mobile. Well, at least if you have hardwood floors or tiled flooring. We’ve found that wheels don’t work as well with certain types of carpet as they do on a hardwood floor.

Home office chairs with wheels are going to allow you to stay sitting more as you move around your office. However, is this necessarily a good thing?

We don’t think it is. In fact, many people might want to look at all the different types of home office chairs and consider non-wheeled options precisely because they will encourage them to stop sitting and move around a bit.

They say that if you sit for long enough each day, you can be doing as much damage to your body as if you were smoking!


You Have More Options With Wheels

Due to the popularity of having a chair with wheels, you can find a great many more office chairs with wheels than you can find chairs without wheels.

Now, if you check out our list of the best sustainable home office chairs, you’ll see it’s not hard to find desk chairs with or without wheels.

But we’d be lying if we said there weren’t more options of desk chair with a set of wheels than without too.


You Can Get More Features

Office Chairs

Not all desk chairs are provided with a wide range of features, but we’ve noticed that an office chair with wheels simply has more features than one without in most instances.

You’ll find things like lumbar support on all types of office chairs but it’s hard to offer things like adjustable seat height, seat tilt, or even a fully ergonomic chair without wheels.

That doesn’t mean that it’s impossible to find a chair that isn’t a rolling chair to fit your needs, it’s just going to be harder and possibly more expensive to find the right chair.


They Tend To Be More Adjustable

And as you might expect wheels provide more features and, in turn, that provides wheeled office chairs with more adjustability options too. The two things tend to go hand-in-hand.


Good Reasons To Go Without Wheels

Now, before you buy a desk chair with wheels, you should be aware that an office chair without wheels has its attractions too.


It’s Cheaper

It's Cheaper

If you don’t want to spend a fortune on an office chair, then going wheel-less is a good idea.

While a wheelless desk chair may have fewer adjustable features, you pay for features – fewer features means less cash outlay.

We should also note that the weight limit on an office chair without wheels is often much higher than its wheeled equivalent. If you’re one of the many home workers who tend to the larger side, this can be a big deal.


It’s Easier To Put Chairs Without Wheels Together (And To Maintain Them)

Home offices with wheel-less chairs require less assembly work and less maintenance.

Chairs with wheels are awesome right up until you need to learn how to clean the wheels on a home office chair– then they can suddenly seem much less appealing.

A wheel-less desk chair can be cleaned like most chairs in your home, with a quick wipe of a duster.


They Go Better With Certain Floors

They Go Better With Certain Floors

Putting wheels on some wood floors is a very bad idea unless you want floor damage that is. (We would note that polyurethane wheels can be less damaging but… they also handle less weight than other wheel types – polyurethane is also plastic and not kind to the environment).

Non-wheeled chairs in combination with a chair mat can leave you in a position where you don’t leave scratches every time that you move around.


They Look Awesome

Now, this may not be an important factor in your choice of seat but we should point out that chairs that stand on four legs rather than casters, tend to look better too. Metal legs can be very durable too.

When they’re standing there, upright and proud behind your desk, they catch the eye – it’s the sort of chair that a CEO or an executive opts for when they spend a lot of time in the office.


Final Thoughts On Should Your Desk Chair Have Wheels?

So, there you have it. It’s entirely up to you if you opt for chair support with rolling casters or without them. There are many chairs out there to choose from and before you put five wheels on carpeted floors, you should think about what you want from a chair.

There are distinct benefits to both kinds of chairs and only you can decide which one you want to spend long periods sitting in each day. Before you buy any kind of chair, it can help to read reviews of it and see if the overall opinion is that it will meet your needs.