Top 7 Best Office Chair for Hip and Lower Back Pain

The human body isn’t designed to be stuffed into office chairs for eight hours a day, five days a week, every week of the year – for years and years on end.

And, truth be told, office chairs (even some of the cushiest and comfortable chairs around) aren’t designed to support our health and well-being, either.

Anyone that has spent time parked in a chair knows the toll it takes on our back, our neck, and – especially our hips.

What happens when you constantly sit with poor posture or don’t use an ergonomically designed chair.

#1 Poorly designed chairs encourage you to sit with poor posture which can cause your hip flexor muscles to shorten.

Poorly designed chairs encourage us to sit in ways that stress our hip flexors, twisting our body into anything but natural positions while stretching muscles in ways they never should be.

Over time this stress adds up and a little bit of discomfort turns into more serious cramps. Before you know it, the connective tissue and cartilage inside your hip joints are wearing down and pain is a daily presence.

#2 Sedentary lifestyle can contribute to extra weight gain that places stress on the joints around our hips.

And that’s not even mentioning the fact that living a sedentary life that has us parked in chairs four hours each day can contribute to significant weight gain.

All that extra weight places stress on our bodies and our joints (particularly around our hips), compounding the issue even more.

Combine that with weakened muscles that aren’t getting worked out as much as they should (muscles that might have prevented joint damage) and posture problems that amplify these stressors even more and finding the right chair becomes critically important.

That’s what we are here to help with!

Our Picks for hip pain

This detailed guide breaks down (almost) everything you need to know to find the best office chair for hip pain.

Our favorite chair pics below have adjustable seat height and seat angles that alleviate stress and pressure on your hip joints and tendons.

Almost all of them have adjustable seat with options that give your hips plenty of room to breathe, and adjustable lumbar support features help to keep your hips in the right position while sitting – improving blood flow and circulation, eliminating cramping, and keeping your hip joints soft and supple.

Let’s jump right in!

Our Favorite Office Chairs for Beating Hip Pain

Pain in one of your hips may have nothing to do with your hip at all, your hip pain may be a symptom of a problem that’s connected to your sciatic nerve…. check out the chair’s list for sciatica.

Steelcase Gesture

The Steelcase Furniture Company has been making fantastic pieces of office furniture since 1912, building up a reputation for ergonomics, comfort, and productivity-focused furniture over the last 100+ years.

The Gesture is one of the most unique pieces of furniture they’ve ever made, a piece of furniture designed with ergonomics as the foundation – and everything else coming secondary from there.

For starters, the Gesture offers a seat height adjustment range long between 16 inches and 21 inches. This allows it to comfortably accommodate people between the heights of 4’11” and 6’4” tall.

You won’t have to worry about the seat height being too low causing upward pressure on your legs and your hips. You won’t have to worry about the seat height being too high, either – an issue that can cause discomfort, forcing you to cross your legs while you sit, damaging the tendons and your hip joint specifically.

The seat is standard size with a slight forward tipping angle. It has just a few degrees of forwarding angle, almost unnoticeable to the naked eye, but your hips will appreciate the tilt all the same. The front-to-back tilted angle helps to take a lot of pressure off of your hip joints while promoting better circulation throughout your lower body.

The armrests are almost infinitely adjustable, helping to keep them out of the way of your hips so that there’s no pinching and no constraints there, either. Being able to adjust not only the height but also the inward/outward positioning of the armrest makes it a lot more comfortable, too.

Combine all of that with a legendary 12 year warranty, really intelligently designed ergonomics (especially in the lumbar region), and a maximum weight capacity of 400 pounds and this belongs at or near the top of any list of the best chair on the market today!

SIDIZ T50

A couple of standout features help to separate this option from the rest of the pack when it comes to finding the best office chair for hip pain.

For starters, the seat width (18.5 inches) on this chair is generously oversized specifically for improved hip health.

You’re not going to feel tight or constrained, you won’t have to worry about your hips being squeezed while you sit, and there’s more than enough room on this wider seat base to stretch and move when you’re starting to feel a little tight.

The depth of this seat is also fully adjustable from between 18.3 inches to 21 inches and can be adjusted in sync with the lumbar support of this chair.

You’ll be able to find a depth and lumbar positioning that keeps your body in the “sweet spot” – not slouching and not sitting too far back in the saddle, enjoying perfect alignment throughout the posterior chain.

A forward seat tilt of 3° (just like on the Gesture we highlighted above) promotes better circulation, better hip rotation, and eliminates pressure points on the underside of your thigh that can cause discomfort.

The armrests offer 3D adjustability (up and down, pivoting inwards and outwards) and the backrest can be tilted back at five different angles with a maximum of 25° recline – all helping to support better posture, less pressure on your back and lower body, and improved comfort across the board.

Office Star ProGrid

While this office chair is very attractively priced, it offers a lot of features that significantly more expensive chairs rarely include – with the real star of the show being “One Touch” pressurized controls that allow you to adjust almost every aspect of this chair to fit your body at once.

Carefully engineered to be as close to a “one-size-fits-all” option has exists on the market today, the ability to adjust seat height, seat angle, lumbar support, recline angle, and more (just by pushing one button) is a game-changer.

The one piece backrest (wrapped in mesh material that won’t overheat) and mold and conform to your body thanks to these controls.

You’ll also be able to adjust your seat height from between 18.25 inches and 22 inches, your armrest positioning (with 3D positioning possible), and the depth of your seat – up to 19.5 inches deep – with no difficulty at all.

Like a lot of our other favorite pics for the hip pain, this chair also has a slightly forward angle seat. The “out-of-the-box” positioning maintains a neutral angle, though you can lean it forward (3° forward) while adjusting the seat depth if you are so inclined.

Combine this with a seat that is 21 inches wide (leaving lots of extra space on either side for your hips to rotate freely) and you’ll find working at the office becomes a whole lot more comfortable when you have this chair beneath you.

Modway Edge

This chair – the Modway Edge – takes the idea of almost infinite adjustability to the next level when it comes to office chairs.

For starters, almost every aspect of this chair – from the height of the seat to the angle of recline on the backrest, to the positioning of the armrests (and everything else) – can be fully adjusted to your ergonomics while you’re sitting in the chair.

Out-of-the-box the chair has been “dialed in” for average sized Americans (5’9” tall, about 170 pounds) but mastering the adjustable components takes no time at all.

The seat height adjustable between 17 inches and 21 inches, guaranteeing that the seat never sit too low (putting upward pressure on your hips) or too high (causing drag, discomfort, and compelling you to cross your legs and pull your hips out of alignment).

The seat pan itself is intelligently contoured to offer a more relaxed and open position for your hips, angling to the forward area of the chair at a more severe angle than most other options. This also opens up your hips, improves circulation, and works in conjunction with the lumbar region to perfect your posture.

Though the chair offers plenty of “passive” lumbar support in its overall ergonomic design, it also provides synchronized tilt components. This allows you to dial in tilt and tension control to guarantee that your feet stay firmly planted on the ground even while you change the seat angle or the backrest posture position.

The bottom line is this – you’ll be able to move your body around with this chair throughout the day without ever compromising your health or wellness. Every adjustment made is countermanded by a different and opposing adjustment through this synchronization, keeping your body in total alignment throughout.

Assembly is a little time-consuming and can be frustrating at times, but aside from that there’s really not a lot to dislike about this particular office chair!

WorkPro Quantum 9000 Series

Engineered to go toe to toe with the Herman Miller Aeron chair, you’ll get about 80% of the same results out of the Quantum 9000 without having to spend that premium price tag that the Herman Miller always commands.

Almost deceptively adjustable, the ergonomics of the Quantum 9000 are designed to be incrementally modified to fit the individual currently sitting in the chair (even while they are sitting down).

One handle beneath the seat allows you to adjust the depth of that seat’s positioning, with two full inches of adjustment (19 inches to 21 inches) along the way. The seat depth is engineered to cradle the body and relieve pressure points, with a slight forward pitch no matter how the depth has been adjusted to alleviate hip issues there as well.

Three-dimensional armrest positioning is pretty common on all of the best chairs options, and the Quantum 9000 is no exception.

Both armrests are fully padded with cushions that are a little firm at first but eventually “break in” to be soft and supple, though they never lose the extra bit of resistance to them that supports good posture. You’ll be able to pivot these 25° inwards as well as 5° outwards, with full articulation up and down as well.

A real favorite feature (according to customer reviews) of the Quantum 9000 is the inclusion of a fully height adjustable backrest.

While this chair doesn’t have the same level of lumbar support that something from Herman Miller might, the fully adjustable backrest makes it a lot easier for folks to dial in a comfort level that supports great posture, too.

Technically a “mid-back” chair right out-of-the-box, most find that the height adjustments allow this chair to fit and feel like a mid-back or a high-back chair depending on how it is dialed in.

Finally, the tilting mechanism on the Quantum 9000 offers about 30° of recline angle when fully maxed out.

The tensioning controls on this mechanism can be left “loose” so that the chair behaves like a rocking chair of sorts, or the user can tighten the controls down and freeze the reclined position of choice in place – again supporting great posture while alleviating stress on the hip region.

Combine all of that with great build quality, mesh materials that are breathable and comfortable, and a fantastic price point and is not hard to see why so many people love this chair.

HOMEFUN Ergonomic Office Chair

Everything about this ergonomic focused chair revolves around incremental (and almost infinite) levels of adjustment that allow you to eliminate pressure points, alleviate stress, and sit for hours on end without any discomfort whatsoever.

This chair uses a unified frame on the backrest as the foundation, with a lot of extra lumbar support and a padded headrest built right in. These design choices eliminate fatigue and stress caused by sitting for extended amount of time.

The entire backrest unit can recline between 90° and 135°, synchronizing the reclining angle with the height adjustment of the seat at the same time. The seat height can move between 16 inches and 20 inches off the ground, helping to keep the users feet firmly planted while the rest of the chair pitches and reclines to continuously promote better posture.

As far as the actual seat on this chair is concerned, it maintains a neutral angle the whole time. There’s no front lip to worry about with this cushion, though – which means blood flow or circulation issues won’t ever be a problem.

Perhaps a slightly forward tipped angle would have been a little better, but a neutral angle is a lot better than a front to back pitched angle that causes cramps and promotes crossing of the legs (both of which are horrible for your hip health).

Fully adjustable lumbar support components can be snapped into the single piece backrest as well, adding better lumbar support and ergonomic positioning than what this chair ships with from the factory.

You’ll need to experiment a little bit with these chair compartments to figure out which works best for you, though!

Furmax Office Desk Computer Chair

Heavily inspired by both gaming chairs as well as chairs found in a race cars, the ergonomic elements of this office chair are immediately on full display.

For starters, the high-back chair and bucket seats with padded armrests make it immediately obvious that this isn’t your “everyday” piece of office furniture. There’s a lot of lower back lumbar support built right into the backrest, and the bolsters on either side of the back piece help to maintain great posture all day long, too.

The seat also has contoured cushioning, measuring 19.8 inches wide by 19.8 inches deep. That should offer a lot of extra room while eliminating pressure points on your hips, with bolsters surrounding the perimeter of the seat (except the back) to help encourage proper body positioning.

Seating height is fully adjustable from between 15.2 inches to 18.3 inches off of the ground. This eliminates low seat positionings that put upward pressure on your hips, pulling them out of alignment as well as high seat positionings that promote crossing your legs and pulling your hips out of alignment that way, too.

A conventional tilting mechanism is solid though not necessarily remarkable, but it does allow you to recline on demand (like a rocking chair) or lock that reclining angle in place, too. The seat rotates and reclines in concert with the back of the chair, maintaining the lumbar support positioning you’ve already adjusted.

At the end of the day, this chair has definitely been built for those that plan on spending a lot of time in their chair every day. Your hips, your spine, and your neck will thank you when you choose something like this!

Important Things to Look for in a New Office Chair

The chair you’re sitting in all day long will have a huge impact on your health – not just the way you feel right now, but your long-term wellness, too.

This is a big part of why it’s so important to track down the right chair, a chair that supports your body (and your health) every moment you spend in it.

The trouble, though, is not that there are so many worthwhile options to pick and choose from – but that there are so many!

Sifting through all the different chairs already on the market (and the ones that are being added every single day) can feel like an uphill battle. The only way to separate the worthy contenders from the rest of the pack is to focus on the features that make or break the overall sitting experience.

That’s what we’re going to highlight right here!

Ergonomics Make or Break the Sitting Experience

The ergonomics of your new office chair are critically important.

Almost every office chair on the market today is going to advertise itself as being ergonomically sound. But the cold, hard reality of the situation is many of them cannot live up to the expectations they set for themselves.

Sure, some chairs are ergonomically designed in the most basic sense of the word – but only a handful of options (like the choices we highlighted earlier) make ergonomics the top priority.

It should come as no surprise that these chairs are so much better than the rest of the pack.

Here are some ergonomic elements you’ll want to make sure your chair features.

Seat Height

Adjustability when it comes to seat height is of enormous importance, as a person that is 5 feet tall is going to want to position the seat differently than someone that is 6’4” tall – and the best chairs are able to accommodate both of those extremes quite easily.

Find a chair that allows you to dial in the seat height so that your feet fall flat on the floor and your knees are at a 90° angle. This will significantly reduce stress on your hips, your knees, and your entire lumbar region.

Seat Depth

Seat depth is just as important, and you want to find something that provides at least 2-4 fingers worth of space between the end of the chair seat and the back of your knees.

You also want to be sure that at least three quarters of your thighs and your backside are fully supported by the seat itself, and chairs that have a sliding seat section that allows for full articulation are much better choices than those that do not.

Seat Width

Finally, seat width should fall anywhere between 17 inches and 20 inches wide, with at least an inch on either side of your hips to give a little extra space and eliminate pressure points.

At the same time, you don’t want a seat the wide you have a difficult time resting your arms on the armrests. That’s going to produce a lot of discomfort and throw off ergonomics that can compromise your hip health, too.

Lumbar Support is Great for Your Back (And Your Hips)

Adjustable lumbar support isn’t just going to help stabilize your upper body (particularly your spine, your neck, and your head) but it’s also going to help alleviate stress on your lower body – especially your hips – as well.

A slight concave curve in the lumbar region of your office chair will more evenly distribute stress throughout your body. You’ll feel the tightness and tension you’ve been carrying in your lower body and your hips melt away after spending a couple of hours in a chair like this.

The More Adjustability, the Better the Chair

Adjustability is the name of the game when it comes to finding a quality office chair built to support good hip and back health.

There’s no such thing as a “one-size-fits-all” office chair, and any company that advertises their products as such should be avoided at all costs – unless they offer full and (almost) unlimited adjustability.

We’re not just talking about being able to adjust seat height or reclining angle, either.

You should be able to adjust all of that as well as armrest height, headrest height and positioning, the way that your seat sits in the chair saddle, the way that your lumbar support fits your back, and so much more.

Some of the best office chairs from an economic standpoint provide at least five different adjustment options, and really premium chairs offer 15 or more different components that can be adjusted to your hearts content.

The more adjustability you have the more you’ll likely pay for an office chair – but the better it’s going to feel when you sit on it for extended amount of time, and the more custom it’s going to feel as well.

Fabric Choices Improve Comfort, Too

Anyone that has sat down on an office chair with poor fabric and material choices know exactly how hot and uncomfortable they can become in just a few minutes.

Good fabric choices aren’t only going to support your body and eliminate pressure points (particularly in the seat and hip area), but they are also going to have fantastic thermal properties that helps you stay cool and comfortable, too.

It’s just as important to find a seat that takes advantage of fabrics that are durable, long-lasting, and attractive. You want to be sure that your chair is built to last, that’s for sure!

Budget Really Matters

Great office chairs to protect your hips and your back don’t necessarily have to cost a small fortune, but they are (almost always) going to cost a little more than run-of-the-mill “big box” chairs you can pick up for next to nothing.

Remember that at the end of the day the money you spend on this chair is going to be a significant investment in your health and wellness.

You’re going to spend just as much time (on average) in your office chair as you will spend sleeping on your mattress, another piece of furniture that you want to make sure you are investing your money wisely with.

Your new office chairs going to be a big part of your professional life. It’s going to have an impact on your energy levels and your productivity. More than that, though, it’s going to have a huge impact on how you (not just at the office but throughout your day-to-day activities, too).

Budget wisely, for sure, but try to stretch that budget as much as you can to get a chair really worth owning. This is an investment that not only pays off immediately but continues to pay off for years and years to come.