Hi, I'm Phil Freo

I’ve been wanting a standing desk at home, ever since our old Elastic office had standing desks. The key though is getting it to be the perfect height, and not spending a fortune. After some careful measurements I determined that my standing desk surface should be exactly 40″ from the ground, so that my arms at ~90 degree angles would fall perfectly on them when I’m standing (I’m 5’6″ or 5’7″).

Luckily I had an existing GALANT Ikea adjustable desk ($150 new), which can get pretty tall on its own (almost 35.5″). So the trick was to find something sturdy to stick the legs on that was at least 4.5″ tall. Turns out these $10 bed risers will do the job perfectly! Bed risers come in various heights and sizes but these are perfect since they raise the desk 5.25″ and the insets are big enough for the GALANT desk legs to fit.

So, if you’re looking for a cheap standing desk setup, I’d recommend the GALANT from Ikea + these bed risers, and you can have a simple standing desk up to about 41″ tall.

You likely need to raise your monitor up so that it’s at the correct eye level when your head is straight. I’m using books but they also have monitor stands that let you put stuff underneath.

I also recommend a laptop stand like this $33 Griffin Elevator Laptop Stand to raise your laptop (as a second monitor) to around the same height.

It’s a bit messy… but here’s the final product: