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How High Should a Monitor Arm Lift a 27-Inch Display?

By Best Pick Guide Editorial Team · Updated

Monitor arms list a "lift" figure, usually 11 to 13 inches, and a maximum height above the desk, usually 17 to 18 inches. Whether that is enough depends on your desk, your chair and your height. Here is how to work it out before you buy.

Where the screen should sit

The widely used guideline is that the top of the screen should be at, or slightly below, eye level when you sit upright, with the screen about an arm's length away. For a 27-inch 16:9 display, the panel itself is roughly 13 inches tall, so the centre of the screen ends up about 6 to 7 inches below your eye line.

Measure two things

  1. Eye height above the desk. Sit as you normally work and measure from the desk surface to your eyes. For many people at a standard 29-inch desk this is 18 to 22 inches.
  2. Where the VESA plate is on the display. On most 27-inch displays the mounting point is near the centre of the panel. So the arm needs to hold the VESA plate at roughly your eye height minus 6 to 7 inches.

For an eye height of 20 inches, that means the mount needs to sit about 13 to 14 inches above the desk. An arm with a maximum height of 17 to 18 inches above the desk handles that with room to spare, and still lets a taller person or a lower desk work.

What the arms we compared offer

From the listings on our Studio Display comparison page: the Ergotron LX raises the screen up to 17.3 inches above the desk with 13 inches of lift; the Ergotron LX Pro reaches 18.3 inches. The budget arms state extension rather than height, so measure before assuming.

Standing desks need more

If you alternate sitting and standing, your eye height above the desk barely changes between the two, because the desk moves with you. What changes is how often you adjust: a constant-force or mechanical-spring arm that moves with one hand matters more than a few extra inches of range.

Depth and tilt matter as much as height

Being able to pull the screen toward you for small text and push it back for calls is the adjustment people use most. Look for 20 inches or more of reach and at least 70 degrees of tilt. Every arm on the comparison page offers both.

A quick check before buying

Stack books under your current monitor until the top of the screen sits at eye level. Measure the stack. If it is under 8 inches, almost any arm works. If it is more, pick an arm that states a maximum height above the desk of 17 inches or more.

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