Libernovo Office Chair

Chairy Background

We’ve been using Aeron Old Faithful, my Aeron destined for retirement. office chairs at home since at least 2012. The first two we bought refurbished, and frankly, I don’t think at the time I knew that there were different models; they were simply “Aerons”. I do know the ones we got were used office chairs, so whatever companies were buying back then, that’s what we had.

In the intervening years, the Aerons started to die in various ways. I could probably have repaired them – for example, on one, the pleather armrest developed a long split and the foam was exposed; I could have replaced it – except that repairing them is expensive. That padded arm part was something like $100 – enough to make you wonder if a split in the armrest is really an important repair.

I don’t recall what did the first Aeron in, but when we moved across country we decided to throw away the first one. First, we tried to give it away on Craigslist, and when that failed we looked into donating it to Goodwill, but apparently nobody wanted an Aeron that wasn’t in pristine condition. So it went to a landfill.

We kept the second Aeron, which was still in good working order. During COVID, my wife’s company sent her an Aeron for her home office – perks of being an executive. Last year, the piston on the older Aeron blew through the roller base and hammered my wife’s full weight, dropped from four inches and via a one-inch steel shaft, onto a glass carpet protector under the chair. Kudos, BTW, to Koonmi’s Tempered Glass Carpet Protector from Amazon; all that force left only an indelible smudge on the glass. In any case, that chair went into the trash. We bought my wife a new Steelcase Karman A newer, Steelcase Karman mesh hotness to replace her broken Aeron

Finally we reach today. I have chronic back pain, courtesy of the US Army, and I’ve been having increasing trouble sitting in the Aeron for long periods. Additionally, the piston on the Aeron has stopped working: it hadn’t broken through the retaining clip like the other, but it effectively became a non- adjustable-height chair, stuck on the lowest height. I’d been watching a lot of Dan Ahn’s videos (Ahnestly, on Y-tube), and had set my sight on a chair from a new Kickstarter company, Libernovo. Ahn’s done a few non-sponsored reviews of this chair, and he’s clearly been excited by it. After a particularly bad day with my back, we decided to order a new, more ergonomic chair, and I backed the Libernovo project.

Receiving the Chair

The process was net exactly smooth. The project is extremely popular, and they had trouble with communicating shipping information. This resulted in the comments section being swamped with concerned backers who had received no tracking information even after Libernovo announced they’d begun shipping. With Kickstarter, if you know your “batch”, your shipping date range is defined; if your date comes and goes with no tracking communication, it can be alarming. It’s exacerbated by relatively long shipping times for many Westerners, since these chairs were shipped from Hong Kong. My experience went:

• Backed July 28
• Survey (customizations and delivery address confirmation) Aug 28
• Survey confirmed Sept 2
• No tracking information communicated
• Received a footrest Sept 14 (without any warning – no tracking number)
• Received two tracking numbers from Fedex Sept 19
• Received a second footrest (surprisingly – I had expected only one; tracking number 1) Sept 20
• Received the chair Sept 22 (tracking number 2)

Lots of concerned citizens. Note that my first tracking information was a single calendar day before I received the first package, and a single business day prior to delivery of the (much larger) chair. If I were to guess, it’s that Libernovo shipped the chairs for the US en masse, and that tracking numbers for recipients were only generated by Fedex when they took over in-country delivery. This doesn’t surprise me, but if Libernovo learns anything from this, I’d suggest:

• Communicate to individual backers yourselves when their perks go out; don’t rely on shippers
• Tell backers – a generic, form email would suffice – that because of the nature of international shipping, backers may not receive tracking information until the chairs arrive in country and are in the hands of the domestic delivery company.

I believe this would be sufficient to ease most people’s minds; knowing their perks are on the way, and that they can expect a delay before receiving shipping information because of the complexities in international shipping, may not be ideal, but it’s much better than complete silence.

Review

Packaging & Assembly

Libernovo assembly instructions on 3x3 cardboard. The packaging was robust, and well-thought-out. The cardboard is high quality – not that papery stuff that disintegrates into paper flakes when you cut into it, which is used for so many large-item products shipped from China. The outer box is substantial and heavy, the inner cardboard still quality but lighter. Even the plastic is heavy-duty, with a nice mixture of clear protective bags for the large stuff, and that matte, white plastic so loved by Apple and Google for the smaller items. There are remarkably few small parts – four screws (plus one surplus); a very nice, handled allen wrench The Libernovo utility kit, and the fanciest allan wrench I’ve ever seen. that you’ll want to keep for your toolbox; the battery; the piston; the coasters; and the tension knob. Small parts come all in a box, nicely separated and individually wrapped. The screws even come with Loctite, a detail you don’t often see. The instructions are cleverly printed in color on the protective flat, laminated, top cardboard sheet. It’s such a great idea: you can prop the assembly instructions against the wall and refer to them during assembly, rather than having to fuss with a flimsy, folded sheet of paper.

There are four large parts: the headrest; the back; the main frame; and the base. It all goes together quite quickly, attaching with four screws, friction, and one USBC plug. I have no doubt it could be just as easily disassembled for transport; there are no arrowhead-style connectors anywhere – you know the kind, that click in easily but are impossible to remove without descroying the connector? None of that crap.

The Chair

Is it pretty? I prefer the clean look of the Karman, but function over form, in this case: the Libernovo is much more comfortable. First, I want to address a criticism that has often been leveled at the chair: it’s even been mentioned on Ahn’s channel, and that’s how loose the arm pads are. Ahn’s comment was on a pre-prod model, and I believe the arms have been stiffened since then. A couple of people commenting on the campaign have said they had trouble with theirs being too loose. Mine seem fine. They do move easily, but honestly this is turning out to be a benefit for me, as I can swing my arm out for mousing without fighting with the armrest or having to have my arm hang off of it; and they don’t move at all if I’m just typing, which is mostly what I do. They do move when I get in and out of the chair, but again, the fact that they aren’t stiff means moving them back where I want them is trivial. I think this sort of thing must matter more to people who want to fixate everything in a specific position, because adjusting takes a lot of concentration. I’m more of a “move it until it feels right” person – it doesn’t have to be at exactly the same angle every time as long as it feels OK, and the arm rest satisfy this perfectly for me.

The star of this chair is the headrest. It’s wonderfull. It has a lot of range, it’s not loose, and it’s comfortable in all positions. It makes me wonder how I managed without one on the Aeron for so many years. There isn’t much more to say about it, except that it is – as far as I’m concerned – perfect.

The Libernovo has four fixed recline stops: upright, slightly reclined, casually reclined, and fully laid-out. So far, I’ve used the first two quite quite a bit, and I’d probably use the third if I were watching a video or something. The fourth is so comfortable, I could sleep in it, and in fact taking a nap was almost he first thing I did in this chair. With the footrest (and, if you buy this chair, do get the foot rest), it’s like laying in a lounge chair.

The cloth material is plush, and the foam is quite comfortable. I’m not a conneseur of padded chairs, having spent so much time in mesh chairs, and I do think I still prefer mesh; padded chairs simply can not compete with mesh for temperature control, and I like the kind of support mesh provides. That said, the padded back on this chair is more comfortable than a mesh back, and it occurs to me that I may be at odds with conventional wisdom on this. Mesh/padded combination chairs usually have mesh backs and padded seats, and I’d do exactly the opposite. In any case, in full recline, I suspect mesh on the back would be less comfortable, and upright it’s very comfortable. I’ve never seen a chair with a mesh seat and padded back, so that would be odd in any case. Many people prefer padded over mesh, and perhaps I’ll come around myself. If there’s a padding and material that could convert me, it’s the Libernovo materials.

The controls are far easier to come to grips with than the Aeron, which I always found confusing. I always had to search for the height adjustment on the Aeron. The Libernovo has two levers which are easily distinguishable as to which does which, and a tension knob which – once set – I doubt I’ll ever use again. The lumbar support is controlled electronically with buttons on the armpads – those are unambiguous – and the arm heights have little lever locks which are straightforward. The headrest has another lever lock behind it, which is automatically under your fingers if you reach to adjust the headrest. Everything else is friction adjusted. There’s no setting on this chair that would necessitate a manual, as opposed to the Aeron. I’m really happy about that, because making adjustments is something I do rarely, and things I do rarely I tend to forget quickly. The confusing adjustments on the Aerons were always a source of irritation for me.

I’m not sure how I feel about the lumbar support, yet. The adjustment hits higher in the back than I’m used to; Ahn mentioned this, but decided that, while unusual, it actually works well. I haven’t used the chair enough to be able to say; it still feels odd to me. I’ll have to reserve judgement.

The materials on the chair feel cheaper than on the Aeron. Although plastic, the Aeron feels more like steel in a plastic case: hard, dense, and heavy. The Libernovo plastic is much lighter, which gives it a cheaper feel, but also makes the chair much lighter. You never contact the plastic in the Libernovo unless you’re adjusting it, so it’s probably not much of a concern, but the Aeron does feel more substantial and higher quality in that respect. OTOH, I’d rather move this chair up and down the stairs than the almost immovable Aeron. It’s a subconscious bias that may have absolutely no bearing on the function or longevity of the chair. After all, I’ve had three Aerons crap out on me over the years; dense plastic clearly is no indication of longevity. The Libernovo also feels less substantial than the Karman; again, the materials are less dense, there’s almost no metal on the Libernovo, comparatively, and the Karman is far more rigid and heavy. Again, this has almost no impact on the comfort of the chair, but if appearances matter, the Karman will impress people more. It looks better, too.

The Libernovo moves a lot. Again, it gives the impression of flimsy-ness. The headrest is especially flexible, rolling when you roll your head. This is clearly intentional, though, as the entire design of the chair is around moving with you. While the initial impression may be of a lack of quality, the end result is that you don’t so much move in the chair, as the whole chair moves with you when you move. It means you’re not fighting the chair, or using a lot of effort to shift. The headset rocks when you turn your head, and the whole backrest rolls with you when you twist in your seat. The clever part is that the armrests stay perfectly positioned under your arms when you lean back, since they’re linked to the back rather than fixed to the base.

Comparison

I’ve mentioned that I have the most experience with the Aeron line of chairs, at home and most places I’ve worked. I also own a Varier Kneeling Chair (with the back), which I used in the office for several years. I’ve also sat in my wife’s Steelcase Karman quite a bit.

The Libernovo is new to me, and one think I know is that comfort has to be determined over time. I’ve had the chair less than 24 hours, and sat in it for only 4 or 5. What I can say is that I’ve never liked sitting in the Karman. My wife finds it very comfortable, but it doesn’t have enough lumbar support for me. At the moment, I think the Libernovo is more comfortable than the Aeron, but this could just be the new-car-smell effect. I have had no moment where I’ve considered rolling the Aeron back out of the corner; if nothing else, the headrest on the Libernovo and the fully-reclined position have become features I don’t want to give up. I’m more relaxed in the Libernovo, and the armrests are working better than the Aeron’s did, keeping my hands in perfect touch-typing position, without effort – palms floating in air and fingertips just kissing the keys. I’ve always struggled with resting my palms on the table, and for the first time it’s not only effortless, but I couldn’t rest my palms on the table if I wanted to, unless I took my arms off the arm rests. I have a trackball I rarely use (I do almost everything with the keyboard), but to use it I just swing my arm over and the armrest comes with it; the only downside I can foresee is that the trackball I’m currently using is designed such that you rest your hand on it and move the ball with your fingertips, and it tends to slide unless you rest your entire hand on it. With this configuration, resting my hand on the device is awkward. It may be that the chair and trackball are just not a good match, and I may need a different trackball. I also think this wouldn’t work as well with a mouse – again, because you’d have to take your arm off the armrest and maybe move it out of the way? I don’t know. It won’t be an issue for me since I don’t use traditional mice.

Lessons

Two things I learned from experience: first, the instructions imply assembly requires connecting three electrical cables. Mine came with all cables connected except one, the USBC connector from the seat to the frame. I did spend a few minutes trying to figure out what I was missing – my guess is that a late improvement has these ship pre-connected, but the instructions had already been printed. Given the probable cost of the instruction sheet, I can understand the company not wanting to re-run those, and I will happily forgive small errors like this – I’d rather have the large, quality, solid assembly instructions with a minor error than cheaper booklet instructions.

The footrest, without risers. Second, the footrest comes with risers. These risers are only used when the footrest is assembled in the taller configuration. The assembly instructions don’t make this clear, and it is possible to put the footrest together wrong (with the risers, but anchored at the lower setting), but it feels wrong and only takes a minute to realize the risers are optional. It’s less an issue with the instructions than a lack of common sense in this user.

Conclusion

I’m extremely happy with the Libernovo. It’s a great chair for the price – I like it more than the more expensive Steelcase Karman, and so far I like it more than the Aeron (whatever they’re going for these days). It’s easy to assemble, has a fantastic headrest, wonderful fabric, and an amazing recline position. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it.