Blacklyte Atlas Lite Standing Desk review — Stand out

It’s not something you think about often, but a good desk can make your life a whole lot easier. Since 2014, I’ve been using one I got from Ikea. It worked well for college and a few years after, providing some storage with shelves in addition to holding at least two monitors, a keyboard and mouse, and various nicknacks on top. It was a good desk, but it wasn’t meant to last over a decade, becoming something of a hazard by the end of its life with wobbly if not outright broken legs and black paint constantly falling off. I’ve been looking for a change for quite a while, when the Atlas Lite Standing Desk by Blacklyte came around. It seemed perfect, with adjustable height allowing for seated and standing work while also being big enough to accommodate my workspace. I’ve been putting it through its paces over the past few weeks, and I think I’ve found something that’s going to last me a long, long time. 

Before you can use a desk, you first need to put it together. The Atlas comes in two separate packages, one containing most of the base and legs, while the other has the actual desktop and a few other parts. Both are incredibly heavy, and I wouldn’t recommend you, for example, lug the whole thing up a flight of stairs by yourself. Putting it together solo is a bit of an easier task, but some help is recommended just for safety reasons. Everything you need is provided, including screws, a screwdriver, and a wrench just like those used for Ikea furniture. The directions are fairly straightforward, so with a little time and elbow grease, you’ll have yourself a standing desk ready for use.

Controlling the desk’s height is incredibly easy. During construction, you’ll attach a controller to either the left or right side of the front of the desk, then hook it up to the legs and plug through included cables. If you’re worried about loose wires, the Atlas actually has two cable management attachments built in to keep things clean, one on the center underside and the other at the back. Once everything is all hooked up and plugged in, you hold the down arrow to reset to the lowest position, then adjust height at your leisure. You can use the up and down arrows to freely adjust, then press and hold one of the four preset buttons to save that height. When you want to return to that height, simply press any button on the controller to wake it up, then your preset. In my case, I have one set for sitting height, and another for standing height so I can freely swap between them whenever I need to.

Once I got my computer set back up, it really is that easy to use. I was a bit worried about wires not being long enough for standing height, as there’s no place attached to the desk for my computer other than placing it on the desktop. My previous desk had a little shelf for the computer and other items, so while I do miss that it all works perfectly fine. I did put it together incorrectly at first so it was a bit wobbly, but after fixing that It’s incredibly steady.

There is one thing about the Atlas that has consistently annoyed me, however, and surprisingly it all has to do with the plug. It’s got a bright green light on it to show when it’s receiving power. I keep my desk in my bedroom, and it’s bright enough that I unplug it at night. Unplugging the desk will cause it to beep a few times. As far as I can tell, there’s no way to turn either of these things off, and it makes me only plug in my desk when I want to use it in a standing position rather than keeping it plugged in at all times.

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