Aeron Chair by Herman Miller - Highly Adjustable Graphite Frame - with PostureFit - Carbon Classic (Medium)

by Herman Miller

• Herman Miller Aeron Chair B PostureFit
• Comes with a PostureFit back support
• Promotes healthy posture

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 26 x 25 x 26 inches ; 55 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 57 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Origin: Made in USA
• ASIN: B003M1C7XW
• Item model number: Aeron Chair Highly Adjustable Size B
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (62 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #21,605 in Home & Kitchen (See Top 100 in Home & Kitchen)
  • #9 in Home & Kitchen > Furniture > Home Office Furniture > Home Office Desk Chairs > Adjustable Chairs
  • #69 in Home & Kitchen > Furniture > Chairs

Product Description

Exceeding all expectations and standards of its predecessors, the Aeron Chair, with its 12-year warranty, has become the new benchmark in the arena of ergonomic office, seating.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

363 of 366 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Aeron Chair is Wonderful...with Caveats June 20, 2008

By Bookworm

I understand why the Aeron gets mixed reviews for comfort, and have come to peace with this. For years, I have sat in my company's Aerons, for hours at a time, and loved them. They were comfortable and I wanted one. So, I bought one. I brought it home, sat in it, and within 10 minutes my legs were tingling and after an hour my back and legs were aching. I tried the chair again the next day and had the same problem. The model I bought was a size "B" Aeron. I returned it today for a size "C" (1.5 inches longer seat depth). Now, my legs feel fine. So what gives?

The Caveat: If the Herman Miller sizing chart shows you to be an A/B or B/C - in other words, capable of using a B or C sized seat in my case, watch out. While you might normally think this means that you could 'theoretically' fit in either seat, what it really means is you have a borderline condition and you need to dig deeper. The B sized seat was painful for me, even though the chart implied I would be comfortable with that size. On the front of the Aeron seat, below the mesh, is a foam crescent-shaped insert. If you get the wrong sized seat (for your actual needs, not for what the chart says), the foam crescent applies a LOT of pressure on the exact wrong part of your thighs. I found the pressure from the B sized seat crescent to be absolutely intolerable. Fortunately, my local retailer let me swap the chair out.

The C size seat adds about 1.5 inches to the seat depth (the distance from the front edge to the rear edge) and, on me, that extra distance moves the crescent forward enough to shift the pressure point to a part of my leg that is less sensitive. I now have no pain in my legs. The point to all this?... Use the sizing chart as a basic guide, but if you plan to buy an Aeron, you need to sit in the chair first and size it up for yourself, especially if you are between sizes.

Here is a point on the lumbar support vs. the Posturefit unit. The lumbar support is just a block of rubberish plastic pressing against your back. It works, but if you put it in the wrong place, it will be a pain. The Posturefit unit is more refined and allows a degree of tuning that the lumbar unit does not. However, either can be painful if set incorrectly for your needs. Set correctly, each contributes to your posture.

In conclusion, the Aeron is well-built, really cool and expensive. However, if you get the wrong size - even if Herman Miller thinks the size is a good fit - it will be a pain and you will hate it - absolutely hate it! Remember that these are chairs, not feather beds. Don't build up a false expectation - driven by excessive marketing hype - that sitting in the chair will be some orgasmic experience. Whenever you sit, your skin, muscles, nerves and bones experience pressure. Until Herman Miller repeals physics, pressure = potential discomfort. The Aeron reduces but does not magically eliminate the potential for discomfort. For me, it took 2 chairs and a lot of research and knob twisting to get an acceptable (but not perfect) level of comfort. Take care in your selection! Read more ›

63 of 64 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Very good chair but not perfect January 17, 2009

By Manish Kumar

Pros: (#1) Posturefit provides excellent lower back support. (#2) *Full* warranty for 12 years makes it a good, long term investment. (#3) Excellent range of adjustments & features. Forward tilt makes reaching for the keyboard & mouse comfortable & ergonomic. (#4) Well-designed arm pads. I can move the arm pads out of the way when I don't need them by lowering them all the way down

Cons: (#1) Doesn't provide much upper back support. (#2) With the correct chair size, pellicle mesh & hard plastic frame are good but still not as comfortable as memory foam. (#3) The chair is susceptible to defects and breaking down. When my new chair arrived from an authorized dealer, the locking mechanism for forward tilt was faulty.

Other thoughts: (1)Given pro #2 and con #3, buy from an authorized dealer. Warranty is a big part in justifying the cost. Chances are that at some point the chair will need repair and without warranty the individual parts are very expensive! (2) Try the chair in person for at least 30 minutes to find the size best for you. (3) Herman Miller has a semi-annual sale after Thanksgiving & in June that is 15% off for their products like the Aeron.

102 of 108 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Good but take care on sizing, options December 5, 2008

By decisivemoment

I evaluated this chair, HM Mirra, both the original and version 2 models of the Steelcase Leap, and Humanscale Liberty and Freedom chairs, and ended up with a used original Steelcase Leap high-back.

The Aeron is a good design in my view. But when you're picking out a chair bear in mind the following:

1. Aeron is based on the principle of a rocking chair. The back does recline slightly as you rock back (that is to say, the angle between back and seat increases as you rock back) and that's ergonomically sound as far as sitting in the chair is concerned, but for a desktop computer user it will lower you quite a bit relative to the screen especially since the pivot is close to the front of the seat. The good news is that back support stays very consistent because the back and the seat keep touching each other through the movement. The other models are basically recliners; the seat pan slides slightly forward but does not go down, while the back lowers, so you stay more level with the computer. Downside is that lower back support on recliners weakens as you recline because the pan and back separate a bit. You will in my view retain slightly better posture in a reclined position in the Aeron than you will reclined in other chairs.

2. Particularly concerned about lower back support? Aeron's PostureFit and their standard lumbar are both better than the competition in my view. PostureFit is good for an upright sitter but a bit uncomfortable though when reclining. The standard lumbar is uncomfortable set in its standard position; lower it all the way and it is does what I feel it should do.

3. Because of the mesh, Aeron is not particularly well shaped around the upper back.... Next to the Humanscale Freedom or Mirra, upper back support is questionable; next to the Leap or Liberty, Aeron's upper back support feels almost non-existent. Humanscale's Liberty, also a mesh chair, solves this problem by creating a curve similar to the Leap by way of sewing three panels of mesh together side-by-side in vertical strips, much in the way a nice pair of bike shorts or tights would work, instead of using a single panel that can't really be properly tailored.

4. Sizing is really important. In my view, the Aeron's adjustability does not allow for enough different body types and also Aeron sizing runs "small"; size C kicks in for most people above average height. Also on the Aeron, you cannot adjust seat pan depth, while you can on the other models. So you have to have it right to start with. Someone with short legs and a long torso is going to be in particularly deep trouble on the Aeron, as you have to go with the deep-seated C size in order to get a reasonably high back. Aeron's B size has a back that in my view is much too short given the size of the chair. And you cannot adjust the arms on the Aeron laterally; you can pivot them but you can't actually slide them into a narrower setting as you can on the Leap. Another reason to make sure you're getting the correct size. (HM fixed this particular issue on the Mirra; let's hope they issue an update for Aeron).

5. Mesh selection is also really important. There are a number of new fabric options on Aeron which are much firmer and frankly in my view more comfortable than the original pellicle. Also, I wonder about how durable the pellicle is; it seems to me to be rather like asking for trouble. If the pellicle feels too much like lawn furniture or dumps you into the mechanism underneath the seat pan, you might want to consider the denser, tweedier looking fabrics such as "wave."

As I say I ended up with a used high-back Leap. The Humanscale Freedom is meant for a very small person; the Liberty's arms are even less adjustable than Aeron; I was concerned about the durability of the Mirra's plastic back, even though it is ergonomically excellent, and the Mirra's seat pan is quite small; and the new Leap is slightly smaller than the old Leap high-back (though much better than the old Leap standard back) and has cheap and nasty padding on the arms, thinner padding on the back and not as good a support in the lower back, although to be fair it also has substantially nicer padding on the seat pan than the original. Overall I would say that either the new or used Leap is capable of fitting the widest range of people in a single chair. Humanscale Liberty is an outstanding choice if you don't mind the rather wide fixed spacing of the arms.

Overall, getting a "commercial quality" chair is worth it. Compared to Office Depot and Staples self-assembly, the chairs from HM, Steelcase, Knoll, Humanscale etc. are more durable overall, they're much more comfortable and adjustable, they look better, warranty protection is better, they're more repairable, and they're pretty much all American made. Read more ›

49 of 53 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing chair March 6, 2005

By Ask Bjřrn Hansen VINE™ VOICE

When I get home and is exhausted with my back and whatnot killing me, where do I go? Not to the couch and not to the bed; I plump down in my Aeron chair to get relief. Mine has the old lumbar support, but I'm looking into getting the new "posture fit" back support thing; I tried it in the store and at least for me it seems much nicer.

Regarding the bad review here, I suspect the reviewer didn't put in the time to figure out the best settings or -- worse -- keeps the chair too high and didn't get a foot rest. You can't have your feet dangling in the air, that'll mess you up no matter which chair you sit in!

There are many good chairs now competing with the Aeron, some of them cheaper, but at least for me there's no doubt it's so worth it.