Buy NowMultiple Buying Options Available$699 $559 at Vari$699 $559 at AmazonCommentLoaderSave StorySave this storyCommentLoaderSave StorySave this storyRating:9/10
WIREDEasy to assemble. Cut-out shape good for ergonomics (and plus-sized people). Good-looking, in a minimalist way. Wide range of adjustments. Relatively quiet motor. Compact. Sturdy. Lifetime warranty.TIREDSome may want more depth, or different widths. Cable management could be better.In my job as a product reviewer, I have learned to fear large boxes. Each one that arrives, whether an office chair or a pellet smoker, might mean anywhere from 20 minutes to multiple hours scratching my head at arcane diagrams, while bent upside down trying to find the right place to put a screw without dropping it.
And so the four-step instruction manual on the Vari Ergo electric standing desk was a source of immense relief. Ever since the Texas-based standing desk company first started rolling out standing desk conversion kits in the early 2010s (then under the name Varidesk), Vari has put a heartening emphasis on ease of assembly. This is an underrated quality, one that goes along way toward forging a good relationship between me and my furniture.
By the time I had the Ergo upright and plugged in, 10 minutes out of the box, my desk and I were pretty much good buddies. It’s a relationship that has continued apace over multiple months of testing.
The Ergo is sturdy, easily (and quietly) adjustable across a broad range of height from 25 to 50 inches, and somewhat elegant in a minimalist way. It doesn’t have any drawers, and I might want better cable management, but the Ergo otherwise covers most every base I need covered from a standing desk.
The Ergo’s virtues are quite simple: The desk is sturdy on its T-shaped legs, with minimal wobble. It adjusts easily, with a relatively quiet dual-motor system, across a broad range from 25 inches to 50 inches high. The warranty is for life, at least on manufacturing defects under normal operation.
The desk’s three-stage, T-bottomed legs mean the desk stays stable even at its top height—a problem among some desks in the lower price range, and I’m able to set four different pre-set heights. In practice, this is one more than I even need: I have mine set for seated typing, face height for Zoom calls, and standing height.
Photograph: Matthew KorfhageAnd somewhat distinctively, the front edge of the desk is sloped forward in a “waterfall” shape so that my elbows and wrists can rest easily without digging in. This is a small point of comfort that ends up mattering quite a bit over a long workday. And though my desktop is less slab-of-walnut than walnut-grain fiberboard, the Ergo does retain a certain minimalist elegance.
All of this is perhaps expected from the newer generations of Vari standing desk. The Vari ComfortEdge, WIRED’s top-pick standing desk for most people, is actually a slightly newer model than the Ergo and contains most of these virtues.
But especially with a couple of pivotal updates to its design, I wonder if we’ve slept on the Ergo a bit. Over time, the Ergo has also become a slightly more affordable option than the ComfortEdge, making it worth a new look.
First things first: The Ergo is a bit more svelte than most models of ComfortEdge, 26 inches deep versus 30 inches. This works for my needs, but if you’ve got a deep laptop stand and a large monitor setup, take heed. The Ergo also only comes in one breadth, 54 inches across, which happens to be perfect for my office space. But if you need a desk for a smaller space that’s only 40 inches across, ComfortEdge is still the model you’ll want.
But the Ergo offers a couple features I’ve come to appreciate considerably over the course of this summer. One is a gently rounded, cut-out shape in the front that allows me to pull closer to my keyboard without running into the desk. It’s possible that this is an especially attractive feature for those of us whose middles have expanded a bit in their middle years. But I’ve made my peace with all this.
Photograph: Matthew KorfhagePhotograph: Matthew KorfhageThe other is a pair of grommeted openings on each side to allow power cords to be pulled through the desk without abrading against wooden corners. Some might prefer the sleekness of an unbroken desktop: The ComfortEdge relies on a rear cutout to pull up cables. But what I like is easy cable management and the ability to draw all my cables together so I don’t end up tripping over them later.
The main thing that you’ll give up with the Ergo, aside from 4 inches of real estate, is the option to add castered wheels to move your desk around. Previous production runs of the Ergo were not designed to be compatible with Vari’s optional under-mount desk drawer ($129), requiring a drill and some faith. But as of late last year, the newer Ergo is designed with pre-drilled holes to accept a drawer for your pens and pencils, though I have not tested this option.
But in the meantime, the Ergo has actually become a downright affordable option by holding its suggested price steady over the past three years—coming in at one or two hundred dollars less compared to comparable-width ComfortEdge models.
If I sound glowing, I mostly am. At its price range, especially, the Ergo has relatively few faults. Former WIRED reviewer Martin Cizmar had similar difficulty finding flaws with Vari’s ComfortEdge.
But if the Ergo lives by the sword of cable management, it also dies by it a little. While the grommets let me thread power cords through for my own devices, I do wish there were a better out-of-box solution for the power cord to the Ergo’s dual motor, which hangs down by default unless I tack it to the bottom of the desk.
There’s also the slight matter of Vari’s impact detection system. This is a good feature, one that stops the desk from pushing forward into obstacles. But in practice, I found it a little sensitive. If the desk detects even slight resistance from power cords, it declines to move forward until I sort out whatever is causing the resistance.
Photograph: Matthew KorfhageOn the one hand, I don’t want my cords to yank out from their sockets, or knock things over as the desk raises or lowers. On the other, maybe I want a manual override—lest this sensor be a failure point, and a test of Vari’s lifetime warranty someday down the road. Note also that Vari’s lowest desk height of 25 inches might still be too high for those 5’2” or shorter, if you don’t want to worry about footrests.
But for most users, the Ergo offers pretty much all of the functionality I need from a standing desk, with a lifetime warranty that takes the risk out of my purchase. I can find standing desks I like more on aesthetic grounds, or for specific use cases. But for now, it’s difficult to find a desk I like better for simple reasons.
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