best heavy duty monitor arm

The stand that came with your monitor is probably serviceable. But I've never come across a monitor with a stand I'd truly call "great," even among the best monitors you can buy. At best, your monitor moves up and down when you want it to, and at worst, they take up too much space on your desk. That's why getting a mounting arm is a great idea for any workspace. It gets your monitor up off your desk and clears space, making more room for your computer, for instance, a new MacBook Air.

Eletab Monitor Arm

Manage your cables : EleTab Desk Mount - Single - 17-32-inches

Staff Favorite

EleTab's VESA arm features a full 90-degree up and down tilt, full landscape, and portrait swivel, and channels for holding your monitor's cables to help keep your desk neat. It supports monitors up to 17.6 pounds.

$46 at Amazon

Amazon Basics Monitor Arm

Beyond basics : Amazon Basics Premium Single Monitor Stand

This monitor arm attaches to your desk with a sturdy clip, lets you easily rotate your monitor between landscape and portrait orientation, and has a tilt range of 70 degrees backward and five degrees forward. It supports displays up to 25 pounds.

$116 at Amazon

Vivo Monitor Arm Render

Great budget option : VIVO LCD Monitor Desk Mount Stand - Single - 13-27-inches

This is a good stand at a reasonable price. The arm fully extends as you need it to. It provides 15 degrees of tilt in every direction, and 360 degrees of swivel, making it easy to orient your monitor between landscape and portrait positions. It also supports displays up to 22 pounds.

$34 at Amazon

3M Monitor arm

Heavy duty : 3M Dual-Swivel Monitor Arm - Black

This is a tough, heavy-duty monitor arm. Despite its strength, the arms are actually hollow, allowing you to run your cables through the arm to tidy up your workspace. It supports monitors up to 30 pounds, which should be enough to hold up an iMac.

$104 at Amazon

Vivo Dual Monitor Arm

Dual-wield monitors : VIVO Dual Arm Monitor Desk Mount Height Adjustable

This is a great option if you've picked up two monitors and need to mount them both. It features a heavy-duty clamp, so the weight of two monitors won't cause it to tip over, and each arm is independent of the other, so you can adjust each screen to the perfect height for your needs. Each arm supports monitors weighing up to 14.3 pounds.

$45 at Amazon

Eletab Dual Arm Monitor

Manage every cable in existance : EleTab Dual Arm Monitor Stand

Like its one-armed counterpart, this dual-arm desk mount from EleTab offers detachable cable management clamps that let you cleanly route your cables behind your monitor. Each arm supports monitors up to 17.6 pounds.

$69 at Amazon

Amazon Basics Dual Monitor Arm

Nowhere near basic : Amazon Basics Premium Dual Monitor Stand

AmazonBasic's dual-monitor stand takes after the single-monitor version, with both arms offering a tilt range of 70 degrees backward and 5 degrees forward and provide a wide range of motion. The monitor attachment plates support both 100-by-100mm and 75-by-75mm. Each arm supports monitors up to 20 pounds.

$220 at Amazon

Jarvis Monitor Arm

Mount up : Jarvis Monitor Mounting Arm - Fits up to 32-inch Computer Displays

Utilizing a gas-activated mechanism, Jarvis' mounting arm will offer a sturdy platform for your monitor while still allowing for easy repositioning when it's called for. This option supports monitors with a weight of up to 19.8 lbs and comes in black, silver, and white color options.

$99 at Amazon

Husky Mount Vesa Adapter

Adapt your stand : Husky Mounts VESA Adapter Plate - Hardware included

The arms on the rest of this list primarily support the 100-by-100mm VESA size, a common size for the mounting bracket on a lot of monitors. If you've got a monitor with a larger mounting bracket, up to 200-by-200mm, this plate from Husky Mounts will let you adapt any of the arms on this list to hold your monitor.

$14 at Amazon

Huanuo Dual Monitor Stand

Great for large monitors : HUANUO Dual Monitor Stand

The HUANUO Dual Monitor Stand will hold 2 monitors up to 35 inches each with double gas springs that minimize jitter and noise. You have 2 mounting options, using either a grommet or a C-clamp. The stand also provides cable management so you can keep your desktop clutter-free.

$90 at Amazon

These are all great monitor arms, but I'd pick up the EleTab Single Monitor Desk Mount if I were getting one. It's a nice balance between price and ease-of-use, wide tilt angles, and built-in cable management as great additional perks make it one of the best monitor arms you can get for the price, even if some of those great USB-C monitors have made that less of a concern than it used to be. But it'd be hard to go wrong with any of the monitor arms on this list. Each has the strength to hold most common monitors.

EleTab also makes a Dual-Arm monitor desk mount for anyone who needs to mount two monitors, which lets you freely adjust both screens as you need to. Both arms can hold most flat-screen monitors under 18 lbs.