Herman Miller Mirra 2 vs Aeron: Which One Is Better?

Bought the modern fabric-covered model with full adjustability. Got lucky with a “used” model. I sure couldn’t tell it was used, still had new plastic smell. Thanks Amazon warehouse!

So I never sat in a mesh style chair before, and I must lament my ignorance, it is the only style of office chair anyone should consider. Especially after years of dealing with cushioned chairs going flat.

All adjustments are easy and intuitive, the lumbar support is very well designed and spread out comfortably. The rocking feature is very nice, and the tension adjustment is the strongest I ever experienced.

For reference I am 190lbs and 5’11”. Can I stay in one position comfortably for hours in this chair? No, but it has so many ways of quickly adjusting that makes enduring long hours at the desk pain free and pleasant. And I can tell this chair will be durable for the next decade easily.

Oh, the arm rest pads are glorious. Herman Miller makes the best arm rests ever.

The best part is the chair is it’s super easy to assemble & super comfortable. It arrives in 3 component parts & no tools required. Took about 3 minutes to assemble & 3 minutes to adjust the fit to my body. Herman Miller chairs are basically indestructible & will last. I’ve had the same Herman Miller chair at the corporate office for 20 years & decided to upgrade the home office. Definitely worth the money.

Back plastic mesh broke in two spots about 2 inches in on both sides (4 broken areas) in lumber area after 4 years. The broken pieces poke the back when you sit. The comfort was alright before this.

I do not know why this chair is getting such good reviews because this is the worst chair I’ve ever sat in. Our company, a major bank, purchased new chairs for everyone in the building and did not bother to tell us we were getting new chairs. The old ones were very comfortable. One day they were just gone and replaced with these awful Herman Miller chairs. They even took the backrest that I had attached to my original chair away with it. However that is irrelevant to this review. The reasons why this chair is so uncomfortable is because of multiple problems. There is no padding for the seating area. When you sit on this chair the seat is not flat, you sort of sink in a little bit (kinda reminds me of those awful foldable chairs with no support you would buy for camping) which makes it very painful for my hips. I brought in a pillow from home to put on the chair and it seems to help a TINY bit but not enough to make my hips not hurt. I cannot adjust the seat depth to go from front to back, I can only make the very front edge roll (or more aptly put – curl) downwards towards the floor, this does not increase comfort as it digs into my calves. The only chairs my company did not replace are in the conference rooms so I had to steal the chair from that location and swap it with the new Herman Miller one at my desk. It is still not as comfortable as my old chair but it’s better than this Herman Miller chair. ANY chair would be more comfortable that this Herman Miller chair. No one I know in my company likes these chairs. I do not recommend this chair for anyone, especially somebody who has just had surgery or has orthopedic problems. I can’t believe my company spent major $$$ for these non ergonomic chairs – what a waste of money.

The Aeron Chair is worth every penny. Like most people in office environments, work study, play WOW have issues with finding the right chair. Having a chair that is actually sized more for your height and weight makes a huge difference by itself as opposed to one size fits all, I’m 5’11 /155 lbs, ordered the Size B, building a chair on the Herman Miller site to assure proper fit for me. Convinced its directly related to health at the end of the day, so I won’t say I wish it was cheaper because it probably wouldn’t be the quality that it is and I would be wanting to swap it out right away. Plus it looks a lot better in person, noticed I don’t lean forward, or twist and turn as much as I normally do.

The chair came in a box fully assembled as others mentioned, I did swap out the casters, not that the original ones were bad; honestly didn’t use them but to move 5 feet and back, the carpet with roller blade type casters seem to move across 1/4″ carpet a little easier. I have never been 100% happy with any chair without finding flaws just after a few hours, being in IT and previous sales, have sat in my fair share of chairs as most of us have. I’m certain I will continue to buy this chair from now on for home use.

Switching to working from home has caused me to not only be sitting more often, but to be sitting in my subpar desk chair. This has caused me to get lower back pain since it has no lumbar support and is not very ergonomic.

In my search for a solution to the problem I have tried 3 other chairs: Steelcase Leap v2, Herman Miller Embody, Autonomous Ergochair 2. All of these chairs were OK but had major flaws in comfort for me, especially considering the first 2 are very expensive chairs. The Leap and Embody both reclined too far back which caused upper back pain. The ergochair 2 was definitely kind of cheap in construction and was only ergonomic fully upright.

For me being kind of short and liking to sit upright the Aeron is the only chair that offers everything. And it is the only thing that has helped my lower back pain since lockdown.

My work bought this chair for us when we transitioned buildings. It felt so much better on my tail bone due to the mesh fabric that I bought this one (the one I am reviewing) for my home office brand new. I alternate between this chair and standing at my desk periodically. What I found is it is causing mid-to-lower back issues for me. My back aaaaaaaches now due to the chair not having lower back support. The mesh fabric allows your lower back to roll to the back of the chair. The controls that should provide support to your lower back are very poorly built and actually put a little pressure above the lower back. It’s in the wrong spot. Don’t buy this chair. It’s way too expensive for this much back pain. Find a chair with lower lumbar support if you have a desk job.

When you pay $1300 for a chair built for big and tall people you really expect it to offer support for someone your size.
I am tall but not big, that seems to be a curse when looking for a chair.
At 6’5″ I weigh around 220 so while I don’t need 300lbs of support or an ultra wide seat, I do need a tall back and an adjustable lumbar.

Well while the tension on this lumbar adjusts, the height does not. It presses into my sacrum and upper glutes, and offers no support for my lower back. Consequently after enough long days I started to develop severe sciatica issues.

At first I didn’t want to blame the chair (having spent as much as i did) but after eliminating my sciatica issue the first time I went back to my desk and working for 8 hours again, stood up and, almost fell over from the pain.
Another 3 days of stretching and heat/cold ensued.
This time I ended up rolling up a pillow and pressing it down to where I needed support and after a full day of work, no issues.

What’s most frustrating is that this seems to be the trend with most “Big & Tall” chairs.
They should actually just read “Big”
This chair is not designed for a tall person. I would say if you are over 6 foot (maybe 6’2″), keep looking.

The overall build quality really isn’t that impressive compared to my last chair and while some of the adjustments are nice; This is NOT a $1300 chair.

I’ve sat in much nicer chairs with a plethora of adjustment options that cost slightly less.
An adjustable lumbar height, seat depth slider and a higher back would’ve made this a chair for a “Tall” person.
As it is now, it is built for a “Large” person but will only give “Tall” people a lot of aches and pains.