Backforce One Plus: the chair I only write about because something broke

You do not write about an office chair as long as it works.

You sit in it, every day, and never think about it for a second. That is exactly what the Backforce One Plus was for me, for two and a half years.

It only got interesting last week. When the top pad of the 5D armrest simply broke off.

The One Plus is an ergonomic chair made in Germany, somewhere between office chair and gaming chair. Handbuilt, with a synchronous mechanism, adjustable lumbar support and those 5D armrests that slide in every direction and fold away.

Two and a half years without thinking about it

That is honestly the biggest compliment I can give a chair.

No sagging, no creaking, no spot where the upholstery gives up. The adjustments stay where I set them and stay there.

A chair that still holds like day one after two years does not stand out in everyday life. And it is not supposed to.

It was simply the place where I work. It did not need any more thought than that.

What broke

And then something does break after all.

The top part of the 5D armrest, the piece that normally adjusts in every direction, gave up. Not dramatic, but clearly off.

While looking for a fix I stumbled over something I had not been aware of at all: Backforce gives a ten year warranty on everything that is not a wear part.

And the armrest pad does not count as a wear part.

The warranty claim that won me over

This is where it gets concrete, and this is where the chair actually won me over.

• Thursday evening I opened the warranty claim.
• Friday at 10 am the reply came that the replacement part was on its way.
• Five days later I had everything at home to repair the chair myself.

No back and forth, no two week proof of purchase ping pong, no hotline handing me off to another hotline first.

I did have to fix the defect myself, that is true. But the part was there, it fit, and afterwards the chair was as good as before.

This is exactly the moment you find out whether a manufacturer is only friendly while you are buying, or afterwards too.

The honest limits

• It is not indestructible. My broken armrest pad is living proof.
• You have to repair it yourself. No technician shows up, a package does. If you have no appetite for screwing things back together, know that.
• It is not cheap. North of 600 euros you pay for build quality, adjustability and, as it turns out, for support that actually delivers.
• Ten years of warranty sounds big, but it means the chair without wear parts. Castors, for example, are excluded. The first three years are full warranty, after that it runs on until the tenth year.

Would I buy it again?

Yes. And honestly more now than before the repair.

Before, it was just a good chair I sit in. Now I also know what happens when something does break. For a piece of furniture you use daily and pay a lot for, that matters at least as much as the seating comfort.

For people looking for an ergonomic chair for the home office or the office who want a few years of peace, the Backforce One Plus is a very solid choice.

For anyone who just wants the cheapest chair on the shelf, of course not.

In the end it is almost paradoxical: what convinced me was not that nothing ever breaks. It was how calmly it went when something finally did. And that is pretty good stuff.