DXRacer Craft Series Chair Review – Make it Yours

While not yet anywhere close to the level of Herman Miller and the $1,800 Logitech collaboration, DXRacer has slowly been working its way up to target the premium mid-range gaming-slash-office chair market that only continues to grow globally. Each different product line for DXRacer offers different comfort technologies and it has all culminated in the latest product line from DXRacer: the DXRacer Craft series.

Out of the box, the DXRacer Craft is largely pre-constructed and only needs a few personal touches for assembly. Think ‘adding an egg to a Betty Crocker recipe’ level of personal touch. In the oversized shipping box, you have four main pieces and then a box of the various casters and gas lift. Assembly is largely a four-step process with smaller steps in between. Slot all five casters into the bottom of the chair base then attach the gas lift and shroud to the opening in the center of the chair base. After that, remove the bolts from the lower half of the chair seat, slide the chair back into position, and reattach and tighten the bolts before sliding the magnetic covers into place to hide the bolts from view. Flip the chair over, attach the single piece gas lift assembly, slide on the plastic actuator arm covers (these were significantly tight for me and took a fair bit of pressure and gentle hammering to slide all the way on. Then lastly, just set the chair down atop the star-shaped wheelbase and you’ve got a finished chair and the headrest pillow can be thrown on at any point afterward.

It’s nice to have a chair manufacturer understand that the end-user doesn’t want to cut open bags of bolts and sort them out by size and letter arrangement like an Ikea tutorial. Simply having all of the pieces include the bolts already attached and ready to slot together reduced the possibility of losing a bolt (DXRacer thankfully includes one extra just in case) before you get the two chair halves put together. From cutting the tape off the box to getting that memory foam headrest into the perfect height, I was finished in under fifteen minutes and that included stopping to take pictures along the way.

Each piece of the DXRacer Craft’s lower base is improved over their previous lineup of chairs. The underside base unit that controls the tilt and height of the Craft chair is a single unit that’s mounted directly underneath via four bolts that already come partially screwed into the chair itself. Two extended plastic bars slide onto the handles, giving the end-user access to both controls: a simple turn of the left control flapper locks and unlocks the chair tilt while the right-side flipper controls the gas lift. Both controls are accessible directly below the armrest and while I did like that neither control sticks out beyond the seat of the chair, it was a little awkward to reach them at first before my brain subconsciously started reaching between armrest and seatback.

The armrests themselves are some of my favorites from DXRacer’s lineup and in general of the half-dozen office chairs I’ve tried out over the years. Both armrests feature a 4D design, giving users the control to adjust the horizontal angle title, forward and backward sliding, and armrest height. The latter is handled by squeezing a solid metal trigger on the outer side of the armrest while all of the armrest functions are activated by pressing in a discrete thumb trigger at the front end of each armrest. This was the first chair I’ve tested that fully locks all of the armrests controls,  even the forward and backward tilt. If you’re in a heated match, you don’t want the armrest to slide back and stop supporting your mouse arm when you’re about to make a clutch play, so I certainly appreciate being able to just lock everything deliberately in place.

Not having an external lumbar pillow in the DXRacer Craft (and some of DXRacer’s other chairs, like the Air) was something I needed to get used to. Rather than a back pillow that needs to be pushed around or even taken off depending on the user’s preference, the DXRacer Craft features a sliding lumbar support bar embedded into the chair itself. The right side of the Craft’s chairback features a star-shaped knob that raises and lowers the lumbar support to the user’s exact preference. Adjusting the support is as simple as turning the knob and can even be done while your back is firmly pressed against the chairback to locate that exact spot that’s most comfortable. Unfortunately, that knob can be a little stiff to turn at its extremes and I found myself having to get out of the chair to fully rate into the perfect position. For a single occupant, this shouldn’t be an issue as you’ll most likely set it once for most of your life but for those that share with friends and family, get used to adjusting the lumbar support on a regular basis.

Whether you like a headrest for your gaming chairs or not, the DXRacer Craft comes with a rather comfortable memory foam pillow that was the perfect size for me, fitting perfectly into that space between the base of my skull and my shoulders. Two strap holes keep the pillow floating at the top of the chair back which is adequate enough for the job but like how the rest of the chair can be locked into the perfect adjustment, I would have liked to see something similar for the headrest as well. If I don’t lift up the pillow into the right position when I get into the chair, it instead sits about an inch and a half lower and presses right into the tops of my shoulder blades. A minor annoyance at best, but in the interest of analyzing each piece of the DXRacer Craft, felt worth mentioning in all.

While the DXRacer Craft is a fantastic chair, the question of price may be on most peoples’ minds. The entry price point for the DXRacer Craft starts at $469.99 for the standard gloss black design, followed by $479.99 for any of the customized designs including the Koi Fish design sent for review. DXRacer informed me that the price will vary for customized chairs but didn’t provide any examples of the price. This puts the DXRacer Craft into the higher tier of gaming chairs that I’ve reviewed for Wccftech (the highest remains the AKRacing Obsidian which was $499.99 at the time of review).

For the price gamers are willing to pay for a premium gaming chair, the DXRacer Craft is a fantastic example of money well spent. The individual technologies at play combine together to make one of the most comfortable gaming chairs I’ve wheeled around the office. While the lumbar support can be cumbersome to set up, it’s one of those features that you’ll set once and forget. If you’re looking for comfort to keep you gaming for long into the night, the DXRacer Craft series should definitely be on your wishlist.

Review unit provided by the publisher. You can order the chair via DXRacer.

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