Atlas L ($719) vs. Titan Evo XL 2024 (629.99) - A Pedantic Perspective
As an owner of 5 Secret Lab chairs, 1x Titan Evo, 3x Titan Evo XLs, and now one Atlas, I immediately felt compelled to share my almost 10 years of experience with these chairs for comparison. In short, I'm disappointed, very disappointed. This feels like the natural evolution of companies that make quality stuff suddenly and quietly cheap out in quality that built their business to increase profit or balance increasing costs and sacrifice their quality to do it. The gaming chair shrinkflation equivalent of your food getting smaller, more processed, and more expensive because why not everyone else is doing it or profit or whatever. Like when a hot new small brand is bought out by a mega corporation and sucks now. Not sure what's happening at SL, I don't pay attention, I'm just a regular 8-5pm cog in the machine.
The Atlas seemed like a new office flagship chair with less of a gamer aesthetic, as it's now $90 more dollars than their gaming flagship Titan XL equivalent. Task chair seems more ergo work-from-home market oriented vs long game sessions in comfort/style, especially with the extra soft part on the seat, more on that immediately below:
Positives/Neutrals:
Comfort:
Overall comfort is great for the seat, maybe fantastic? Having more lumbar support would be nice, but forgivable as the cushion of the seat is more comfortable. I am 6'2", 225lbs, and I can tell a difference in my ass bones on the Atlas. The cold foam only Titan is definitely harder to the touch and felt like it took more time before it was as comfortable as the Atlas is out of the box. 8.5/10.
Tilting/recline:
The highest resistance tilt setting feels weak in comparison to what my body is used to in the Titan, I prefer to sit about halfway back from the full tilt mechanism and letting the resistance stop it naturally. The first 20% of movement feels like there is no resistance, which I am sure will take time to adjust to, but the Titan definitely has more resistance up front from the moment you start to move. I like the simple design vs hunching over like a caveman to adjust the previous style chair's resistance and CRANKIN one way or the other and hopefully it's right. Quick twist is pretty eloquent evolution of this adjustment. 7/10
Negatives:
Wheelbase/Size:
The wheelbase is now entirely plastic, which im entirely sure is made from some fancy plastic that plastics better than other plastics, but it feels cheap in the hand and when assembled, especially compared to the meaty all metal wheelbases found in the Titan. The new wheelbase would probably set a new record from guy that hits his ankles with swinging trailer hitches for an all-time least painful wheelbase. Lighter? Very. Feels worse? You bet. As a small cliff note, I also enjoy resting my feet atop the flat surface of the Titans wheelbase edges during intense focus or whatever, this area on the Atlas is so pointy at the end this is no longer comfortable for more than 10 seconds without shoes. I will miss this. 4/10
Height:
It's also smaller in stature than the Titan, and I know, I know, XL vs L, but the arms don't raise up enough to clear over a desk, only align perfectly. My adjustable desk sits at 30", a height to where my toddler can't reach my keyboard, and it perfectly aligns with the Titan arms, seated or unseated. With the Atlas, now my arm rests only go under the desk and don't align with the desk height enough to even bump it when seated. They press against the bottom of the desk when not sitting, worse of both worlds. 4/10
Armrests:
What made me even write a review for this chair and hand over fist the most frustrating part of this chair is the loose arm rests. THEY DONT LOCK FORWARDS OR BACKWARDS. I sit with the armrests fully forward on all of the Titans, this is not possible for me on the Atlas. Just by sitting with my arms resting and leaning back, the gravity of my arms being pulled to the earth at a slightly different angle is enough to slide the armrests back. Use your arms to assist in sitting up, shuffling, or getting up? Slides all over the place. My very double jointed fingers (I can make C in the opposite direction) can easily move it back and forth just by applying light pressure and moving my hand. If I have them forward, it feels like any type of movement slides them all over the place and they just end up all the way back until I lean forward. This design was not very well thought out at all and sounds like it was designed without real world testing. It immediately feels so cheap and so loose it feels broken. Like how you would expect a chair to feel that has it's locking armrest mechanism broken from decades of use. Twisting them to point in a different direction takes considerable effort, how it should be, how did the forward/backward motion pass any kind of feedback round? The arm is also one piece that connects to the body near the seat, so replacing it would consist of replacing the whole arm or some other method of teardown method much worse than magnets. They also felt uneven to me so I measured it, and even making extra certain they were lined up flawlessly when installing, going back to check, one side is slightly taller than the other. 30.25" vs 30.09" small but noticable if you're also autistic. Listen, I'm fully aware of how nitpicky I am, hence the title of the review, but this type of stuff bothers me and feels cheap for being the most expensive standardized (vs limited special edition chairs) chair I've seen them release. The arms are the cheapest feeling part of the entire experience of using the chair and sadly it's the part that you are forced to inadvertently interact with constantly. I am constantly jarred by sliding armrests in the middle of a train of thought or work meeting/call. I hate them, I didn't know I could hate a part of a chair and I can't believe this is a final product. 1.5/10
TL/DR Summary:
Very disappointed with this chair, having been excited to try it ever since it was announced. Looking back, I would rather have bought another Titan Evo instead of this. The L size is too small for my 30" desk, sits uneven, and the amount of plastic used doesn't aid in feeling like it's a quality chair. A new-age design that looks great and does everything differently but worse. Except for the cushion, that part is great but overshadowed by almost everything else and I suspect that extra soft top part will be coming to a future Titans/Evos at some point. While the visual design has evolved everything else feels like a step back in quality and feel. It's a visually flashy, less-than-ideal office chair that skips out on key usability. Probably the best looking mediocre chair you'll try if you've never owned a Secret Lab chair. If you've owned a modern Secret Lab chair, it's an expensive step backwards.
Score:
5 out of 10