Mesh office chair vs. padded

I hated the herman miller meshy bs chairs at my last job. I was much happier with the previous job's normal looking, but actually super ergo chairs (everything was adjustable, super nice, unfortunately it's some tiny brand that nobody carries), and I got some steelcase leap v1 thing recently for wfh that's ok (I'd like to remove the arm rests, but it's not easy, so it's not going to happen)
 
Anyone go from padded office chair to mesh? What do you think of it? Pros/cons?
The pro is the breathing during hot days if you do not have powerful AC going on, cons is last cushy but that will tend to be quite subjective.
 
Pads hold farts in. This can be an asset in releasing the fart over time, but a liability if they completely capture the fart, then release it when you adjust yourself.

A mesh chair will not help or hinder a fart it any way. It will simply release it to your office as presented.
 
Mesh is great if you run hot, but uncomfortable if you make skin contact.

Padded is more comfortable and good if you run cold. Having both, I'd lean to padded. Even in summer without ac it's usable if you don't mind sweating
 
Gimme da padz or gimme death....cause my backside aint as tough as it used to be :D

I've used both, but the one time I took a chance on buying a meshy, I regretted it within the first 30 seconds that I sat in it.... so I got rid of it & haven't looked back since....

And for the record, I absolutely HATE & despise Herman Miller's chairs....every one I've ever sat in was extremely uncomfortable, from their low end ones up to their super-duper $4k "Executive" models
 
Thanks folks, I move a lot when sitting I'm pretty figgity so I assume I'll just end up stretch the mesh out into some sort of hammock situation. But sounds like they aren't super great unless you need a fart net.
 
The pro is the breathing during hot days if you do not have powerful AC going on, cons is last cushy but that will tend to be quite subjective.
I keep a floor fan in my computer room during the summer for that reason. It's a cheap remedy if it's an option.

Gimme da padz or gimme death....cause my backside aint as tough as it used to be :D

I've used both, but the one time I took a chance on buying a meshy, I regretted it within the first 30 seconds that I sat in it.... so I got rid of it & haven't looked back since....

And for the record, I absolutely HATE & despise Herman Miller's chairs....every one I've ever sat in was extremely uncomfortable, from their low end ones up to their super-duper $4k "Executive" models
Good thing I decided against a mesh chair.
 
Mesh for life. Thanks to my companies COVID WFH program, (sales here remote anyway), picked up a couple Herman Miller Aerons for home at no cost to me. Won't ever go back.
 
I prefer mesh and I'm a big fan of the Herman Miller Aeron. I have a Raynor Ergohuman at home. Most of the time the two are about even, but the Ergohuman has a headrest which is nice if I want to lean back and watch a movie while keeping an eye on something for work. Padded chairs cause a sweaty back & butt, and I don't find padded chairs significantly more comfortable than the stretchy mesh. The one spot where mesh really sucks is if a chair is too small and your backside ends up sitting on the rails on the edge of the seat. Standard size Aeron or Ergohuman is fine for me, but I've run across chairs that were too small. I've had padded chairs at the office and didn't have an issue with most of them, and the couple I didn't like were cheap POS models that made my back hurt. I had a Steelcase padded chair for a while that was good. That's really what's most important -- just having a good chair so your back doesn't get messed up. Your ass will be just fine even if you spend all day sitting on an unpadded wooden chair, but proper back support is a must.

The material I really don't like for a home office chair is leather or pleather. It's hotter than a padded cloth covered chair and your legs stick to it if you're wearing shorts. They're much worse than mesh with shorts. I'd get cloth seats in my car if they actually still made nice cloth seats, but those haven't been around since maybe the '80s? They'd be ok at work. Usually offices keep the AC cranked up enough that mesh vs. cloth vs. leather doesn't make much of a difference, and no wearing shorts at work at most of the jobs I've had.
 
It is personal. I add extra memory foam to pad. Better support for legs.
Normally a proper mesh chair gives the proper support and flexibility and distance from any hard support pieces that your legs feel like they are floating or padded. But, you also pay a small fortune for that.
 
The material I really don't like for a home office chair is leather or pleather. It's hotter than a padded cloth covered chair and your legs stick to it if you're wearing shorts
Sticking during summer is the worst part I agree. It can be fixed with laying some sort of fabric on top usually, but rather completely avoid leather to be fair.
 
I've used both.

What I can say is that, unlike a chair with substantial sponge-like padding... when you fart into a mesh chair... The whole office will smell it. Damn material finely sifts and atomises the cloud...
 
Normally a proper mesh chair gives the proper support and flexibility and distance from any hard support pieces that your legs feel like they are floating or padded. But, you also pay a small fortune for that.
Good chairs, whether they're mesh or padded, are pricey up front but in my experience is they're not expensive on a per-year basis. I'm pretty sure I went through 4 $150-200 chairs between 1998 and 2009. Just went to Office Depot or whatever and bought whatever felt nice. Armrests fell apart, fabric tore, etc. On one of them the seat base broke, and I don't mean the adjustments. The seat base broke. It was a padded chair and some screws pulled out of the piece of plywood that held the whole thing together. Then in 2009 I bought a $700 Raynor Ergohuman. Between that chair and replacing a cheap bed with good one in 2007 I have less back problems (really don't have any) at 46 than I did when I was in my 20s. That chair lasted 12 years without needing any work. In 2021 I replaced the seat base and cylinder. That's the other thing about good chairs -- you can get replacement parts. The cylinder was leaking a little and the recline mechanism wasn't working right. I forget exactly how much it was, but the parts were in the $200-250 range. Now it's working like new aside from the armrests being a little worn.
 
Good chairs, whether they're mesh or padded, are pricey up front but in my experience is they're not expensive on a per-year basis. I'm pretty sure I went through 4 $150-200 chairs between 1998 and 2009. Just went to Office Depot or whatever and bought whatever felt nice. Armrests fell apart, fabric tore, etc. On one of them the seat base broke, and I don't mean the adjustments. The seat base broke. It was a padded chair and some screws pulled out of the piece of plywood that held the whole thing together. Then in 2009 I bought a $700 Raynor Ergohuman. Between that chair and replacing a cheap bed with good one in 2007 I have less back problems (really don't have any) at 46 than I did when I was in my 20s. That chair lasted 12 years without needing any work. In 2021 I replaced the seat base and cylinder. That's the other thing about good chairs -- you can get replacement parts. The cylinder was leaking a little and the recline mechanism wasn't working right. I forget exactly how much it was, but the parts were in the $200-250 range. Now it's working like new aside from the armrests being a little worn.
Ya, this is where that investment in quality does pay off, that initial sticker shock may hurt, but when you have the chair for even 5-6 years +, and what it does for your body, its something to look back and wonder why you didnt do it sooner! Once my basement reno's are done, I will be adding a pretty expensive chair to my set up!
 
I went from padded (stellcase please V2) to mesh (Okamura Contessa) to mesh (Herman miller aeron) back to padded because at home I like to change my pose and place my legs up on a chair and let me tell one thing about padded Vs mesh - mesh works for one pose and one pose only while padded works far better for *unusual* seating positions.
 
i have an aeron from about 2003. paid 300, (company closed facility, it was new unused and still had the tags on it) and since then Ive paid 150 for a gas spring replacement and 125 for a seat pan /mesh replacement. Its time for another gas spring replacement and now the back mesh needs to be replaced but 575 for 20 years of service is damn good and I obviously have no problems recommending this chair to others.

.....even with its above noted inability to filter farts. (or maybe especially in light of???)
 
I still use a 25 year old aeron that has been rebuilt once (under warranty at about 16ish years old). I have two others at the other offices. Getting the size of the seat correct is pretty important on these imo as far as where the legs land in the mesh and front seat frame. I hate sitting in anything else that isn't a well fitted mesh seat and back for any real length of time now. I'll never voluntarily do it again.
 
Hello everyone, this is my first post on this forum.

On topic, while mesh allows for airfow, it is a little slippy. Personally I prefer fabric covered padded chairs, as they "grip" better thus providing better support.
 
My chair history goes from an old padded office chair that I found at goodwill for very cheap (Haworth Improv H.E, apparently; I still have it around here). It actually had a lot of adjustment options, was probably like $10. It was fully padded.

At some point I moved to a Herman Miller Mirra that I got for $375 off Ebay. I used it for a while. It was fine. I found myself not really leveraging its ergonomic options. It was mostly mesh, I guess you could count the plastic back as padded.

I bought a new Gaming Aeron when the Mirra's back cracked at some point. It was like, what, $1280 when on sale? I tried a size C. I liked the adjustability on it. I especially thought the gaming mode was interesting. However, it sat too high even in its lowest setting. I felt it cutting off my circulation, especially when leaning back. I returned it. It's full mesh as I'm sure everyone here knows.

Just today, I went to a secondhand office furniture flipper and found a Steelcase Leap V2 that they changed the fabric and armpads out on. It was from 2010, but the gas spring felt good and the armrest adjustments felt like they had close to just the right amount of resistance. Not too loose like you would get with some aftermarket options, or too stiff like from overuse without oiling. It's full fabric and padding.

I think the Steelcase Leap V2 is by and far my favorite chair. I've tried various chairs out in my work office. Part of it is probably the fact that it's padded rather than mesh. I think mesh is great for breathability, but it also gets destroyed pretty easily depending on how much of a rough-houser you are, and also it's uncomfortable to sit in without clothing (in my experience). Fabric is much nicer if you just don't feel like putting your shirt on (or sometimes, trousers) and just getting in the chair. But it can slowly set, depending on the foam. I think mesh can last longer with gentle use. So there are negatives. It just depends on what you want.

My experience with chairs is also that you get what you pay for, overall. There are diminishing returns to everything. Obviously a $20 will support your weight and put you in a sitting position. But when this stuff deals with your spine, and it's dealing with it for several hours a day, there are some advantages to just buying a nicer chair.
 
It's all tradeoffs really:

Mesh breathes well, and doesn't stop flatulence at all lol. If you sit on your legs/feet it can be hard on the mesh, mesh doesn't like hard surfaces. It's more like a hammock for your body but some meshes are courser than others, can be uncomfortable on bare skin. Can't really get it dirty.

Foam and fabric, comfy, easy to get dirty. Can be warm in summer, but it absorbs the sweat instead of letting you soak in it like leather/PU, but the chair will get nasty over time. Pet hair sticks like glue.

Leather/PU can rip especially if you sit on your feet, some breathe better than others... easy to clean, but pet nails can damage it easily.

There's more pros and cons but I'd have to mull.
 
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