Standing Desk + Treadmill = Treadmill Desk

As software engineers, we are inclined to spend most of our time sitting. Nowadays, it is common knowledge that you should not sit all day and make minimum 10.000 steps daily. Like software engineering, most other jobs today also require you to sit all day.

Since I work a lot, I can not go to a gym. Going to a gym is not prioritized in my life. After work, I prefer to spend time with my family and work a little more before sleep. If I have any extra time, I prefer to spare that time for hobbies like electronics, learning new frameworks and building Lego (recently).

I’m getting older, and knowing that my sedentary lifestyle is not healthy, I started to think about what I could do about it. Of course, I’m not the only one having this problem, and I have discovered that I can combine working with walking.

The solution is combining a standing desk with a small treadmill. Likely I have found that Walkingpad has a slim profile foldable treadmill that can be located anywhere easily. In 2019, Walkingpad was the only option in Turkey. But today, there are other brands with similar products. Walkingpad was a subbrand of Xiaomi, and the product is of excellent quality. We were so happy with Walkingpad we ordered one more for our home, and our relatives and friends also purchased the same product. After two years of use, we needed to get it serviced, which was not a good customer experience. I will return to this later, first the good ones.

Finding a standing desk was more difficult in Turkey in August 2019 than it is today. Although currently there are some options, still there aren’t many choices. Since it is not viable to work in a standing position all the time (at least for me), I wanted a desk with adjustable height to switch between standing and sitting easily. The desk’s raising mechanism can be motorized or hand-operated. A motorized desk allows switching between different positions faster. Some models also have favorite position settings and Bluetooth control. In my opinion, the favorites setting is handy, but Bluetooth control is not necessary. Control buttons are within reach of your arm, so it is easier to press a button than to open an app on your phone. To adjust the height of a manually controlled desk, you need to turn a lever. It takes more time, and if you are like me, it may create friction and cause you not to use functionality. But they are a lot cheaper and easier to find. I needed to purchase the motor separately and attach it to an Ikea tabletop. One important thing when choosing a motor is, and actually, any table leg is, how much weight they can support. I have a big 49” monitor, and it weighs a lot. Minimum and maximum lengths of telescopic table legs are also other critical factors. Don’t forget to add 15cm for the height of the walking pad.

While I’m walking, my dog can enjoy my chair 😉. To switch to a sitting position, stop the treadmill with the remote, fold the treadmill, and lower the table using a button. Adjusting the table height takes a few seconds, thanks to the motors.

In the sitting position, you can also use the Walkingpad for resting your legs 🙂.

I usually walk 3km/hour pace. I can code, read, watch, write at this pace. It requires some getting used to, but it is undoubtedly doable. If I need to concentrate, I can stop the walking pad by pressing a button on the remote or switching to a sitting desk within a minute.

According to the Walkingpad app, I have walked more than 900km. But, the actual number is a lot more than that because sometimes I forget to connect the app with the treadmill or become lazy to do it. I use the remote. Also, I haven’t used the office for a year due to the pandemic. If we subtract the times I haven’t used the office, maybe it is around 3km per day extra walking without spending any time at the gym.