Most people set their monitor height once — when they unbox it — and never touch it again. The stand it shipped with was designed to be cheap to pack flat, not to put the screen where your neck wants it.
Here is the whole thing in one rule, plus how to fix it properly.
The rule: top of the screen at or just below eye level
When you sit up straight and look ahead, your eyes should land on the top third of the screen. Your gaze then travels slightly downward across the rest of it, which is the direction your eyes prefer to move. If you are tilting your head back to read the menu bar, the screen is too high. If your chin is dropping toward your chest, it is too low — and that is far more common, because almost every stock monitor stand is short.
Measure it in 30 seconds
- Sit the way you actually sit. Not your best posture — your real one.
- Close your eyes, relax your neck, then open them looking straight ahead.
- Note where your gaze hits the screen. Aim for the top third.
- Measure the gap between that point and where it should be. That number, in centimetres, is the riser height you are shopping for.
Most people land somewhere between 8 cm and 12 cm. That is exactly the range a monitor riser is built to cover.
Why stacking books stops working
Books are the classic free fix, and they do work — for about a week. Then the stack shifts when you knock the desk, the heights never quite match on a dual-monitor setup, and the space underneath is unusable because anything you slide in there destabilises the pile.
A purpose-built riser solves the part books cannot: it turns the space under the screen into storage. A keyboard slides under the Stilt when you are done for the day. The Notch adds a drawer for the pens and cables that otherwise live on the desk.
What if your desk is too high?
Raising the monitor is only half of the ergonomic picture. If your elbows sit above your wrists when you type, the desk is too tall for you — and raising the screen further will not fix that. Lower the chair until your forearms are parallel to the floor, add a footrest if your feet leave the ground, and then set the monitor height from that new seated position.
Measure after you have fixed the chair, not before. People routinely buy a riser that is 4 cm too tall because they measured from a seat height they were about to change.
Picking a riser that fits the desk, not just the screen
The dimension that catches people out is depth, not height. A riser deeper than your desk overhangs the front edge and you will catch your wrists on it all day. Measure your desk from front edge to wall before you choose.
- Shallow desks — a slim single-shelf riser like the Stilt keeps the footprint small.
- Corner desks — an angled shelf such as the Plinth follows the corner instead of fighting it.
- Shared or open desks — the Vault adds a lockable drawer under the screen.
- Ultrawides and heavy panels — check the stated load rating on the product page and give yourself margin.
The short version
Fix the chair first. Measure from how you really sit. Buy for desk depth as carefully as you buy for height. Then stop thinking about it — a riser is a one-time purchase that you notice for a day and benefit from for years.