Leap

Wonderful chair for my 75-year-old husband (6'2"), who is tired of his back arthritis getting worse in these regular office chairs. It came full assembled from the company. One pointer that we didn't understand at first is that when you adjust the back to a reclining position, it comes back up when you sit up. So, we adjusted the strength of the upper back force, it's easy to lay back in the reclining position without any resistence.

I have access to an Aeron. The Aeron is a good chair, but I wanted something with depth adjustment. After research on alternatives, I settled on the Leap v2. I purchased it without trying it. It's a well-known brand and chair, so I expected it to be fine. I was not able to go to a showroom and try many chairs, so I after reading reviews, I thought this would be my best bet without trying them. + It has seat depth adjustment + The seat cushion is very cushy, yet supportive. I think it's comfortable. + The back support is height adjustable, but it's very simple. + Arm rests are adjustable: in/out, forward/back, up/down. - It is not super adjustable - Some parts - back adjustment, and bottom of seat - are plasticky and feel cheap. - Doesn't have the name-recognition and looks of the Aeron. - Expensive if buying for yourself With the adjustments available, it is comfortable for me. After receiving it, I sat it in all day, every day for work-from-home. I did not get any back or neck pains that I sometimes get with other new chairs. Overall, it's comfortable for me and I like it.

I work from home and was using a standard office chair that I had bought years ago for occasional use. Over time, I found that I was shifting position in my chair a lot and the seat wasn't comfortable for a full 8+ hours. I also found that my neck started to hurt toward the end of the day. I decided to buy the Steelcase Leap V2 chair because it was top-ranked and was the most adjustable variant of the recommended options. I had no way to test it in person, so this was important to me. I decided to buy from Amazon because the price was substantially lower than other outlets, which actually concerned me. I was concerned the chair might be refurbished (not new), but my concerns were unwarranted. The chair arrived and it is brand new. It arrived in an official Steelcase box, preassembled, with the original plastic/shipping protection. My initial experience with the chair has been very good. The first day did take a little getting used to. I was surprised to find that my back ached and my sides hurt a little. I presume it was because the chair was forcing me to sit properly, engaging my core muscles properly versus my old chair. Fortunately, the aches went away after the first day and since then, I find that I no longer get any neck or back pain. I have had the chair for about 2 months now and I no longer think about chair comfort, which means it works! Had I the chance to do it over, I'd buy it again. I would definitely recommend it to anyone who has a job that requires them to sit for extended periods of time.

The tension knob has lost most of its strength and all of the plastics on this chair have worn terribly, feels like a cheap rubberized remote control after years of abuse by a toddler that drinks too much orange juice, a very sticky feeling, I tried cleaning them with every online method suggested and nothing helps. Did Amazon sell me a fake? I made sure to buy it directly from Amazon and not a 3rd party, Amazon is an authorized dealer. Taken from Steelcase website: NOTE ABOUT AMAZON.COM While Amazon.com is an authorized online reseller of Steelcase products. many independent resellers who sell through Amazon.com are not. When purchasing, it is important to note where the product is being "shipped from and sold by," which is stated clearly in the header for each product on Amazon.com. I contacted Steelcase to see if they can confirm its authenticity or if real do a warranty claim. They told me that I have to deal with Amazon. WHAT!!!! If it is real, they use cheaper materials than a typical Staples $99 special with no support or Amazon is peddling fakes that Steelcase will not confirm it ( I provided the serial numbers). Either way, do not buy this chair because there is no support! Instead, pay the extra for a Herman Miller Aeron, these chairs last for years without issue and are more comfortable to boot. I kept this only because it goes lower than HM and I have a nice desk that is a bit low.

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.

Had the chair for a week. Easy to set adjustments while watching online videos. Was unsure until adjusted the seat pan, then, Ta-Da! Works well. Chair comes completely assembled (don't know why there's a choice to add an "assembly" option sometimes??) and the packaging protects well against shipping damage and is all cardboard (recyclable) and plastic sheet cover. Best to have two people to lift out of the box. Expensive, yes, but well designed, comfortable, and should hold up for years and years. Only complaint is with the totally adjustable arms. Unlike all of the other settings, the arms don't lock in place after adjusting, so if you grab the arm rest to get up or move the chair, the arm rest moves. Not a big deal, but a minor annoyance. The reviews for this chair contain reviews for both new and refurb chairs. Make sure you're selecting which you want. Reviews on refurb chairs have been mixed. The price for the chair I bought changed almost daily. Pick the price point you're willing to pay and jump when it hits that point. The Honey browser extension (and others) is helpful to track price history. I'm always price sensitive, but willing to pay for a quality product, which this is. I bought one for my wife too and she's equally happy with it!

Went from an Aeron B to the leap V2 and couldn't be happier. If you're 6'1 and don't want to pay extra for an aeron size c then this is the chair to get imo. I'm 6'1 215 for reference