The Best Standing Desks Under $400

If you’re looking to get a cheap standing desk, the good news is there are many options on the market to choose from. The bad news is that not all of them are of decent quality. This is where our lab tests really serve to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Our experts have lab tested dozens of sit-stand desks over the years (you can see all of them in our Best Sit-Stand Desk Reviews round-up). As we frequently get requests from readers for a short list of the best affordable standing desks to consider, we previously asked our editors to compile their top picks under $700. Now we’ve asked them to compile the best you can buy for under $400.

You should note that the cost of standing desks has gone up almost everywhere in the market ever since the pandemic with the increasing costs of raw materials and shipping globally, so there are fewer options than there used to be in this price range.

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What Is The Cheapest Standing Desk?

The cheapest standing desk we’ve reviewed is the IKEA Knotten at $159 (and there are even cheaper options available on Amazon) but options in this ultra-low price range probably won’t be quite what you’re thinking of when you picture a standing desk. They might not be height adjustable (like the Knotten), they might have sketchy crank handles for manually adjusting the desk height (slowly and noisily), or they might have such obvious design flaws that they can’t possibly hold up to regular use.

As for the cheapest standing desk that looks like a standing desk, we’ve reviewed the IKEA Bekant that starts at $199. It has two legs and a top, and adjusts electrically. However, you’ll often find that standing desks like these are even trickier because you’re sacrificing somewhere to make this price fit. You can read our Bekant review for more detail, but put simply: Electric height adjustable desks in this price range tend to be underpowered, poorly made, very hard to assemble, and very quick to fail.

When considering standing desks in this price range, it’s also important to consider the alternative of adding a standing desk converter on top of your existing desk. You can get an excellent converter for the price of a very cheap desk. For more information on making the choice, check out our primer on Standing Desk vs. Sit-Stand Converter and see reviews of our Best Standing Desk Converters.

How Much Does A Stand Up Desk Cost?

Standing desks we’ve reviewed range from $159 to well over $2,000. Desks with solid wood or custom desktops can be much more expensive, the biggest and nicest solid wood L-desks ranging up to $8,000. So there’s quite a range, but to make it simple we split up the desks we’ve reviewed into four tiers:

Ultra Premium (over $1,100) standing desks should offer the best desk you can buy. In this price range you should expect stunning finishes and premium quality components. Go to Ultra Premium standing desks roundup.

Premium (under $1,100) standing desks require a bigger investment, but are feature-loaded, usually feature better build quality and warranties, and are sure to match the décor of the executive suite. Go to Premium standing desks roundup.

Value (under $800) standing desks offer good feature sets and specifications without costing as much as the premium adjustable height desk offerings. This tier is typically where you find your best value for the dollar. Go to Value standing desks roundup.

Budget (under $400) standing desks have been optimized for cost-savings. They have generally lower, though not necessarily poor, performance specs, and come with the smallest price points and shortest warranties.

The Budget category is what we’re discussing in this roundup.

Is A Standing Desk Worth It?

Are standing desks overrated? As with most questions, that depends on context. We know that sitting for long periods of time is terrible for you. We also know most people have to work (often at a computer) for long periods of time. How do you reconcile these two facts? You stand while working.

At the same time, a standing desk is not a panacea for all of your back and neck woes. Alone, it won’t help you lose a lot of weight. A standing desk is worth it if you’ll use it (and some have a very effective “health coach” feature to make sure you do). A standing desk that stays at sitting height is just an overly expensive desk that lacks storage.

We also find standing desks to be an excellent “gateway drug” into the world of ergodynamics. Once they start standing more, most people will be very happy and many of those will then move on to explore monitor arms, keyboard trays and treadmill desks.

How Cheap Is Too Cheap?

As part of assessing which cheap standing desk is best for you, we’d like to point out some other important articles on the subject, which we highly recommend any prospective desk buyer reads before they commit to one brand or model over another. Probably the most important is our primer on Why Some Sit-Stand Desks Shake More Than Others, since reasonable stability is going to be the main thing that will be hard to find in a desk under $400—in fact, only one model meets our experts’ standards in this price range.

Along with stability, any buyer should be concerned about manufacturing quality, ease-of-assembly, ease-of-use, customer support and warranty when buying a product of this complexity and cost. For more detailed criteria, see our article How We Conduct Standing Desk Reviews. For more information on what warranties cover and don’t cover, be sure to read our primer on How to Compare Warranties on Standing Desks.

We have not included any manual sit-stand desks in this round-up because they represent less than 2% of the US market at this point; the electric sit-stand desk has won the game, and at this point, there are numerous electric desks that are less expensive and far more reliable than the few sit-stand crank desks still on the market.

It is also worth noting that there are now fewer cheap standing desk options as a result of the new Chinese tariffs, so we’ve had to drop a few former contenders from the roster below. For example, the Stand Desk which found tremendous success as the first $400 standing desk on Kickstarter in 2014 now starts at $479.95 when configured bare bones.

As you might expect the cheapest standing desks most commonly emanate from China. Learn more about the differences in quality, durability and performance you can expect from Chinese-made Standing Desks versus Made-in-USA.

On to the reviews. To see the detailed reviews behind each of these abstracts just click on the link.