IKEA Skarsta / Trotten standing desk review

The Ikea Trotten is an inexpensive, no-frills manual standing desk.

Simple, clean design

Smooth crank mechanism

Few customization options

Can’t support as much weight as other standing desks

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Desktop size: 47.25 x 27.5 inchesMin/max height: 27.5 to 47.25 inchesMax supported weight: 110 poundsElectric: No

If you like flat-pack furniture and lingonberry sauce as much as you do a clean aesthetic, then Ikea’s Trotten standing desk may be just right for your home office. With a starting price of just $249, it’s one of the least expensive standing desks around, too.

However, with that comes a few caveats: It’s not motorized, so you have to manually raise and lower it; it comes in a limited range of colors and sizes; and it supports less weight than some of the best standing desks. But at this price, it could be just right for you. Read the rest of our Ikea Trotten review to find out.

The IKEA Trotten costs $249. You can get it with either a beige or a white top, and choose from white or black legs. A larger model, with a 63x 31.5-inch desktop is available for $279.

If you happen to have a slab of wood lying around, you can purchase just the base frame for $199.

IKEA also makes a few other electric standing desks, including the Rodulf, which costs $349 and has a 55.1 x 31.5-inch top.

Like much of the company’s other furniture, Ikea’s Trotten desk is one of clean lines and simplicity: a rectangular top with matching legs. The table surface doesn’t have any cutouts or holes through which you can route wires, so cable management could be an issue if you have a lot of peripherals.

There’s very little you can customize here — just two table-top colors and two leg colors. Compare that with other standing desks, which offer dozens of finishes and materials to make the desk more personal for your home office setup.

Unlike other standing desks we’ve tested, the Trotten can’t support as much weight — just 110 pounds, compared to as much as 350 pounds for the Uplift and Fully Jarvis. Unless you’re planning to sleep on the desk this shouldn’t be too much a concern.

Although it has no motorized components, the IKEA Trotten took just about as long a time to assemble as electric standing desks such as the Uplift V2 and the Fully Jarvis Bamboo. That’s because, like those other two desks, you have to install brackets on the underside of the desktop, in addition to attaching the legs and the feet. While it’s more expensive, the Vari Desk has a much simpler assembly.

The instructions were easy to follow. In typical IKEA fashion, the manual uses pictograms and dispenses with as much text as possible, so that it can appeal to as wide an audience as possible. It comes with the requisite Allen wrenches, though you do need to provide your own Phillips head screwdriver.

Unlike electric standing desks, Ikea’s Trotten requires you to manually rotate a crank to raise or lower the desk’s height. I found the mechanism was smooth and steady, though you’ll have to do a lot of cranking to move it significantly. When you’re not using the crank, it stows away neatly underneath the desk.

Despite its lighter weight and construction, the Trotten felt stable. At its maximum height, though, it was a little more wobbly than other, heavier standing desks.

If you’re looking for a basic, no-frills standing desk at a good price, the Ikea Trotten is definitely worth your consideration. Among the best standing desks, we love the Vari desk, as it looks fantastic and is even easier to assemble than the Ikea Trotten — and it’s electrified. However, the starting price of the Vari Electric Standing Desk is $695, more than twice as much as the Ikea Trotten.

If you do want an electric standing desk at a low price, check out the Flexispot EC1, which has a starting price of around $300, and offers a number of customization options.

The Ikea Trotten doesn’t give you much in the way of personalization — and you’ll have to crank it yourself to raise and lower the height — but it works well and doesn’t cost all that much.

Michael A. Prospero is the U.S. Editor-in-Chief for Tom’s Guide. He oversees all evergreen content and oversees the Homes, Smart Home, and Fitness/Wearables categories for the site. In his spare time, he also tests out the latest drones, electric scooters, and smart home gadgets, such as video doorbells. Before his tenure at Tom's Guide, he was the Reviews Editor for Laptop Magazine, a reporter at Fast Company, the Times of Trenton, and, many eons back, an intern at George magazine. He received his undergraduate degree from Boston College, where he worked on the campus newspaper The Heights, and then attended the Columbia University school of Journalism. When he’s not testing out the latest running watch, electric scooter, or skiing or training for a marathon, he’s probably using the latest sous vide machine, smoker, or pizza oven, to the delight — or chagrin — of his family.

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