Standing desks promise better ergonomics and healthier work habits, but they come with serious drawbacks most people don't think about until after they've spent 500ドル. I got close to buying one for our basement office until I realized the problems: they're expensive, take up tons of space, and lock you into one configuration. Instead, I found the Mount-It! Standing Keyboard Tray for 83ドル that gives me all the standing desk benefits without any of the headaches. Paired with our HUANUO DS7 Dual Monitor Stand, it works so well that I may buy a second one for my main office.
Standing desks solve one problem but create others
The cost and space trade-offs weren't worth it
I spent weeks browsing standing desks and kept running into the same issue—they're all minimum 300,ドル with decent ones pushing 600ドル–800ドル. That's a lot of money for something that might end up being a glorified standard desk if standing while working doesn't stick as a habit.
The space commitment bothered me more than the price, though. Standing desks are permanent fixtures. Once you've got one set up, that's your workspace. You can't easily move it between rooms or reconfigure your office without a major project. My wife and I share the basement flex office, and we're different heights with different preferences. A fixed standing desk would work great for one of us and poorly for the other, and an adjustable one would be super expensive.
Those bulky standing desk converters that sit on top of regular desks aren't much better. They weigh 30–40 pounds, cost 200ドル–400,ドル and take up half your desk space even when they're in the lowered position. Plus, you're stuck raising and lowering your entire workspace—monitors, coffee cup, notebooks, everything—just to switch positions. And don't get me started on the longer cable lengths you would need for the height adjustments—I detest cable clutter in my workspace. I wanted something smarter and cleaner.
An 83ドル keyboard tray gave me everything I needed
Adjustable height without taking over my desk
The Mount-It! Standing Keyboard Tray, Adjustable Height Keyboard Riser for Desktop turned out to be exactly what I was looking for. At 83ドル.99, it costs less than a quarter of what I would've spent on a standing desk. The platform measures 23.6 by 11.8 inches—plenty of room for my keyboard and mouse with some extra space.
The scissor lift mechanism adjusts smoothly from sitting height all the way up to standing height. The setup took me about 20 seconds—it comes fully assembled. All I had to do was take it out of the box, remove some zip ties, and engage the adjustment lever to adjust the height. The construction feels solid, featuring an alloy steel and aluminum frame with an engineered wood platform. After using it daily for months, there's no wobble or flex when I'm typing.
Here's what makes this better than a full standing desk: only the keyboard and mouse move. My monitors stay put, my notes stay put, my coffee stays put. When I want to stand, I just lift the tray. When I'm done standing, I lower it back down and prop it against the wall next to my desk. Everything else on my desk stays exactly where it is. No adjusting monitor heights, no worrying about knocking things over, no disruption to my workspace.
The real magic happens with dual monitor arms
Independent adjustability beats fixed desk height
Our basement flex office is where my wife works most days, and where I camp out when I need a change of scenery or when upstairs is too distracting with kids home. The keyboard tray pairs perfectly with our monitor setup: two SAMSUNG 32-Inch M8 (M80D) Smart Monitors mounted on a HUANUO DS7 Dual Monitor Stand.
This combination is where the whole system clicks. The monitor arms let us adjust the screen height completely independently of the keyboard position. When I raise the keyboard tray to standing height, the monitors stay right at eye level. I don't have to touch them. My wife is four inches shorter than me, so when she's working, she lowers the keyboard tray and adjusts the monitors down. It takes maybe ten seconds to switch between our preferences.
The desk space we got back is ridiculous. Both monitors lift completely off the desk surface, and the keyboard tray clears out the middle section when raised. We've got room underneath the monitors for my productivity gadgets, notebooks, my wife's planner, and whatever we need in the moment. Before this setup, the monitor stood alone and ate up most of the usable desk space.
Cost-wise, the whole thing came in at around 213ドル. The dual monitor mount was about 130,ドル and the keyboard tray was 83,ドル and we already owned the monitors. Compare that to 500ドル–1,000ドル for a decent standing desk that wouldn't give us nearly this much flexibility.
One solution that works in two different offices
From basement workspace to main office
The flexibility of this setup is what sold me on buying the keyboard tray. My main home office upstairs has a completely different configuration—I work in front of a 55-inch Samsung Frame TV that doubles as my display. The keyboard tray works just as well there, even though the two spaces couldn't be more different.
In the basement, the quick adjustability matters because two people use the same workspace. My wife will work down there all morning with everything set to her height, then I'll head down in the afternoon and reconfigure it in under a minute. No awkward compromise positions, no "good enough" ergonomics. We each get exactly what we need.
Upstairs, I'm using the keyboard tray for the same reason. Even though the Frame TV is permanently mounted 5–6 inches above standard desk height, the display is large enough for me to work comfortably standing. I'm 5'11" and I just have to slightly move my eyes down to see the bottom of the screen—no awkward neck positions. The adjustable tray lets me raise the keyboard to the right height while the TV stays where it feels best for typing and moving my mouse.
When I want to use the keyboard tray upstairs, I just move it between the two offices. However, at 83ドル each, I could buy another to keep one in each room. That's the beauty of this solution—adding standing capability to another workspace doesn't require rethinking the entire room or dropping another 500ドル.
A smarter alternative for less than 100ドル
I spent 83ドル instead of 300ドル–800ドル and got more flexibility than a traditional standing desk or standing desk topper. The keyboard tray adjusts in seconds, saves desk space, and works with my existing setup. Adding it to a second workspace costs almost nothing.
This won't work if you need your entire desk surface to raise—large equipment, multiple peripherals, or physical materials all need a full standing desk. But for keyboard and mouse work, which is most of what I do, this setup beats a standing desk in almost every way. Sometimes the obvious solution isn't the best one, and standing desks aren't the only way to work while standing.