Exercises You Can Do At Your Desk

How much time do you spend sitting in an office chair each day? You can find a range of office chairs online to offer support and comfort to make your job more bearable each day, but it’s not enough if you don’t ultimately want to fall into the trap of the sedentary lifestyle it helps to create. 

Maintaining an active lifestyle outside of your working time is important if you do spend many hours a day sitting at your desk. However, there are additional things you can do right in your chair to help things along as well.

1. Simple Yoga Moves

A good way to get started for the day, and then repeat as you reach your lunch break, and again at the end of the day, is through some simple arm and neck stretches similar to those you’d do in your yoga class, or as stretches before going running or playing an intense sport. Do some neck rotations, shoulder rotations (roll them forwards and backwards), as well as wrist and ankle rotations.

Keeping your arms, shoulders and neck limber is important, especially as they remain so still as you’re working at your computer for the entire day. Stretching in this way will help to prevent neck and shoulder pain.

2. Leg Raising

This exercise has 2 parts, so you should start just by doing the first step which is to sit in your chair and then extend one of your legs straight out in front of you. Hold there for 2 or 3 seconds, and then slowly lower it. If you want to add the second part, first extend and hold, and then raise it as high as you can and hold for a further 2 or 3 seconds.

This is a nice, simple exercise that everyone can try, and can do wonders for your core and lower body.

3. Chair Squats

For this multi-muscle workout, you first need to lower your seat to its lowest-possible seating position. If you’re afraid of messing up your perfect seating position, grab a spare office chair to use. All you need to do is first stand in front of your chair facing away from it with your feet placed apart the same width as your hips. 

Once in position, you squat down until you’re just hovering over the chair seat, hold for a couple of seconds, and then either sit and stand again, or just raise from your hovering position. Repeating this anywhere from 10 to 20 times is a great little daily workout.

4. Chair Dips

If you’re feeling a bit more adventurous, and if you have a chair with solid feet and NO casters, then you can try these chair dips for a major core workout. While sitting at the very front edge of your seat, place your legs out in front and grip the sides of your chair with your hands. Carefully raise yourself off the chair and then down in front of it as far as you can before lifting yourself back up into the chair. Remember to be careful with this one, and absolutely no rolling chairs are to be used!

5. Desk Push-Ups

Finally, if you want to work on your upper body strength (and you’re sure you have a nice solid desk that won’t buckle under your weight!) try these desk push-ups. Place your hands palms down on the front edge of your desk about shoulder width apart while placing your feet further behind you so that you’re leaning and supporting yourself on the desk. Keeping your body straight, lower your upper body down toward the desk while breathing in, then then push yourself back up. Repeat until you can’t do any more, but don’t overdo it at first!