Armrests are treated as somewhere to put your elbows and they are actually carrying a meaningful share of your upper body weight.

What They Are For

Supporting the weight of the arms, which is more than people expect.

Unsupported, that weight hangs from the shoulders and neck, and the muscles there hold it all day. That is a common contributor to the shoulder and neck tension desk workers describe.

Armrests at the right height take that load off.

The Right Height

• Elbows at roughly a right angle with shoulders relaxed
• Arms resting without lifting the shoulders
• And without having to drop the shoulders to reach
• Level with the desk surface, or just below it
• Close enough to the body that elbows are not splayed

Chairs with adjustable or flip-up arms, of the kind at stellamia.org, allow both a working height and getting the chair under a desk, which fixed arms frequently prevent.

Too High Is Worse Than Too Low

Armrests set too high push the shoulders up toward the ears, and holding that for hours produces exactly the tension people take painkillers for.

Too low means the arms are unsupported, which is the original problem but not an active one.

If they cannot be adjusted and they are too high, removing them entirely is frequently better than leaving them.

They Must Clear the Desk

The practical problem. Armrests that hit the desk edge stop the chair being pulled in, so you sit further back and reach forward for the keyboard.

Reaching forward all day is worse than having no armrests. Flip-up arms solve it, and so does removing fixed ones.

Not for Leaning On Sideways

The habit of resting one elbow and leaning is comfortable and asymmetric, and sustained it loads one side.

Noticing it is usually enough to break it.

Width Matters

Arms set too wide mean elbows splayed out, which pulls the shoulders forward.

Some chairs adjust width; most do not, which makes seat width a proxy worth checking.

Padding Wears

Armrest pads are the first part of most chairs to look tired, and on many they can be replaced.

Remove Them If They Fight You

A chair that will not go under a desk is a worse problem than bare arms.

Type Without Them

Resting forearms on a desk edge while typing is a different load again, and a padded edge or a wrist rest helps.

Check They Adjust Before Buying

Fixed arms are the commonest reason a chair will not fit under a desk.