Massage Chair Under $500 Review

You probably noticed in the summary table that most of the chairs on offer are from brands you’ve either never heard of before or are ones you’re only dimly aware of, at best. There’s a reason for that. The big brands tend to shy away from the low end of the market. There’s just not enough profit in it for them, which leaves the field open for lots of little off brands to set up shop and import goods from China for resale here.

Our top pick is the exception to that rule. Osaki is a great brand, and we’ve reviewed a number of their more expensive products. We were thrilled to see that they had jumped into this segment of the market, and the 802E is a surprisingly capable little chair for the money.

Aesthetics & Design

At first, and even at second glance, the 802E doesn’t look like a massage chair at all. It merely looks like a casual living room recliner. That’s a good thing because, in general, massage chairs don’t win high marks for aesthetics.

This one, however, will blend seamlessly into just about any room you decide to place it in, a thing made even easier, given that you can choose from either black, brown or beige when you place your order.

In addition to that, it’s reasonably well-padded, swivels 360-degrees, and comes with a matching ottoman, too. Unfortunately, the ottoman has no massage capabilities built into it, but it does enhance the overall comfort of the chair and is an excellent addition.

Okay, So It Looks Nice, But What About Its Massage Capabilities?

In addition to being an attractive little chair, it solidly outperforms fixed frame massage chairs with stationary heads because it sports dual rollers on an actual massage track. 

Granted, dual rollers aren’t as good and don’t deliver quite as good a massage experience as you get from quad rollers, which are the current industry standard, and the massage track is a bit on the short side, being only 18.5” long but, this is a bargain-priced chair after all. There are going to be limitations.

Even so, the rollers are capable of delivering both a kneading and a vibration-style massage. In practice, the kneading massage feels far better than the vibration-style does, but there are three different vibration variants on offer, and you can select from three different massage intensities. Taken together, this gives you a surprising number of options available, even if the various vibration selections are minor variations.

No Extras

Notably absent from this chair, though, are any extras. There’s no heat, no USB charging port, Bluetooth speakers, Zero-G options, or any of the other niceties you find on more expensive massage chairs. It is defined entirely by its short massage track and the action of those dual rollers.

Our Verdict

Again, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Given the extremely modest price of the 802E, limitations like these are entirely expected. Just be mindful of what it is you’re buying. The key things this model has going for it are these:

So, yes. It’s short on extras (as in, it doesn’t have any at all), but even without extras, it’s still well-deserving of top honors here, given that every other chair on our list of finalists relies on stationary heads to render their massages, and this is the only model that offers something other than a simple, vibration-style massage. We recommend it.

The chair features a total of eight massage heads that do an admirable job of massaging most of your body. You’ll find four heads in the seat back, two in the seat itself, and two more in the leg rest, so even though the chair doesn’t have leg massage ports, it will give you a decent calf massage.

It gets better though, because this chair also offers lumbar heat! While it’s true that vibration massage isn’t world-class, and the stationary heads limit your massage quality, when you combine the options we described above with heat, then factor in that you can also choose between high and low intensity, we have to admit, this chair renders a higher quality massage than we were expecting.

We admit, we’re not convinced that cup holders are an ideal feature addition on a lift chair, because if you forget that you have a drink in one of the holders and use the lift function, you’ll wind up spilling it. Even so, unexpected extras are always appreciated, and as long as you don’t forget to move your drink first, you’ll find the feature a handy one.

Even so, it’s a fairly attractive, comfortable chair and it’s delightfully versatile and offered for a song. We feel that it’s positive attributes far outweigh its negatives and we recommend it without reservation. An excellent choice. 

The Relaxzen chair that made last year’s list was discontinued. This is the model the company introduced to replace it and it’s better in every way. It’s easily the most stylish and attractive chair in this roundup review, being modeled after popular Nordic recliners.

In the world of value-priced furniture, there are two basic approaches a company can take: They can load their chairs up with as many features as they can think of and hope that enough of them are implemented well enough to make it an attractive purchase option.

These factors combine to make it a great choice for people who don’t have a lot of room to work with. Even if you have a smaller home or live in an apartment, finding a permanent home for this little chair should pose no special difficulties.

Like the Wall Hugger we talked about earlier, this model utilizes a fixed-frame with stationary massage heads that provide a basic vibration-style massage. Although there are no massage techniques on offer, the remote does allow you to adjust the intensity of the massage you get through five different levels and you can selectively activate the heads, so you can get a zone massage that focuses only on certain areas of your body. You can choose from:

It gets better though. The Relaxzen Deluxe also offers lumbar heat! While vibration-style massage on its own isn’t exactly world-class, when you add heat to the equation, it does notably improve the overall experience. Kudos to Relaxzen for taking steps to push the limits of the aging technology that serves as the base for the chair’s design.

If you’re not impressed yet, the Relaxzen also allows you to customize the duration of your massage, which is a feature it has in common with the Wall Hugger. Again, this is notable because there are lots of mainstream massage chairs that cost thousands of dollars that don’t offer this feature, so again, this is a job very well done by the design team.

Considering the limitations of the older technology this chair uses, which was a conscious design decision aimed at keeping the price as low as possible, we have to say we’re impressed.

Sure, if the team had built the chair around an L-track and used dual or quad rollers the overall massage experience would have been better but doing that would have also drastically increased its price. We honestly think the company made the right call here, and as the chair stands, the Relaxzen Deluxe offers a tremendous value for the money, wrapped in a very attractive package.

If aesthetics is important to you, this is the one you want, despite the fact that it didn’t win top honors. 

The Windaze Massage Recliner is a good chair that shares a number of features in common with the Magic Union Wall Hugger, and has the advantage of being proudly made in the USA.

And the ability to selectively activate the massage heads, which allows you to give yourself a spot or zone massage that focuses on only selected areas of your body. From the remote, you can choose:

Again, it must be noted that the massage forms fall short of being actual massage techniques, but kudos to the company for offering some ability to customize on this front.

We’ve seen persistent complaints that the lift motor just isn’t up to the job. In addition to being excessively noisy, we’ve seen repeated complaints about it lacking the power to actually assist a user to a standing position, or simply not working at all.

That’s unfortunate, because on the whole, this is a pretty good chair. We do recommend it, but only provisionally. If you don’t absolutely need the lift function and you’re looking for an American-made chair that’s functionally similar to the Wall Hugger, this is a good option.

We’ll be the first to admit it. We love Flash Furniture. This little off-brand makes surprisingly good products that manage to make their way on lists that are dominated by much larger competitors. It’s a great company and it’s clear they know what they’re doing. We don’t feel that this roundup review would be complete without giving this awesome little chair a mention.

Ultimately, it depends on which features are more important to you. If your home is decorated in a casual style, then the Relaxzen chair may stand out, looking perhaps a shade too elegant to fit in with the rest of your furniture, while this model will happily blend right in.

Also, if you plan to use the chair at least as much as a conventional recliner as a massager, then this model is well worth considering, given that it offers a more comfortable seating experience, even if you sacrifice a small amount in terms of massage quality.

We recommend the model. Despite being offered by a smaller company, you really can’t go wrong with anything Flash Furniture makes.

This chair was removed from our list when the company selling it raised its price, putting it slightly outside the $500 cap we set for this review.  It’s still offered for sale, but you’ll pay a bit more for it.

The LAGRIMA Massage Recliner is an interesting design that offers tremendous value for the money. It’s also the only massage chair on our list of finalists that offers an actual massage track and rollers, as opposed to stationary massage heads. By itself, that means this chair gives a better basic massage that any of the others.

Unfortunately, the LAGRIMA has some limitations and other aspects of its design to be mindful of, and these things may prompt you to gravitate to one of the other models, which also explains why this chair didn’t rank more highly on our list, despite possessing better and more up to date massage chair technology.

Let’s start with the things this chair gets right, however.

Decent Dimensions

As to the chair itself, it’s a decently sized piece of furniture, measuring 22.8” x 35” x 34.2” and capable of supporting an impressive 440 pounds. The LAGRIMA also comes equipped with a detachable support pillow for your head and neck.

Upholstery

Moving to the upholstery, as is common with a significant percentage of furniture offered in the value segment of the market, this one is upholstered in PU. It’s attractive enough, but not known for its durability. What makes the LAGRIMA interesting though, is the designers cleverly kept PU away from the areas your body touches when you sit in the chair.

In those areas, the design team outfitted the chair with a much more durable mesh-like fabric that can easily withstand the rigors of moderate daily use, which is about as often as most people can realistically use a chair like this anyway.
In our mind, this is proof positive that although LAGRIMA is a bit of an unknown quantity, they have some solid experience in the furniture market. It’s a small detail, but boy does it have an impact!

Those are the best points of the chair. Now, let’s talk about limitations.

Massage Technique

First, the LAGRIMA only has one massage technique on offer: Shiatsu. It’s a good technique and again, far better from what you can get from stationary massage heads, even ones that claim to replicate the Shiatsu technique.

Massage Programs

Second, although there’s one pre-programmed massage technique, in practice, it’s not notably different from just turning on the full-back massage option on the chair’s control panel. Note that we said “Control Panel.” The LAGRIMA doesn’t actually come with a remote. Instead, you’ll find four buttons located on the right-hand side of the chair. These buttons, labelled “full body,” “back,” “auto,” and “spot.”

While we love the fact that there’s no learning curve to speak of, it’s important to bear in mind the things this chair can’t do so prospective purchasers know exactly what they’re getting. Among other things it doesn’t offer:

Leaving these items off then, was a conscious design decision by the company to keep their costs down.

Verdict

Overall, we’re impressed with this chair. If offers a surprisingly good basic massage that is easily the equal of, and often superior to the massage that any of our other finalists are capable of rendering. Unfortunately, that’s literally all it does. 

If that’s all you’re looking for, or if you’re willing to get a bit creative to find other ways of enhancing your massage (like using a heating pad to simulate lumbar heat while enjoying your massage), this is a good option. If you’re looking for any extras at all, however, this isn’t the chair you want.

Having said that, it’s offered by an unknown company with limited capacity for post-sales support. Something you’ll want to consider carefully before committing to a purchase.

This chair was removed from our list of finalists when the company raised its price significantly, putting it well outside the maximum price we set for this roundup review. It is an undeniably excellent model, but it carries a hefty price tag that may put it out of reach for people on extremely limited budgets.

HoMedics is a medium-sized, well-respected company in the home health market. This chair was designed and built for them by Cozzia, which occupies more or less the same space in the massage chair market, making them a good, natural fit for strategic partnerships like this.

At this price range, most massage chairs are lacking even in some of the more basic features people tend to look for, which is one of the main reasons this model was so richly deserving of top honors here.

Granted, it’s a very basic chair and doesn’t sport a robust feature set that can compare with more expensive, mainstream massage chairs, but it does have the basics incredibly well covered and is more than capable of delivering a massage experience that you’ll love.

Aesthetics & Design

One thing to mention before we get into the massage particulars, though, is that this is a smallish model, with overall dimensions of 37.25” x 24.5” x 38.75” and weighing in at just over fifty pounds. Those details matter because they impact the chair’s maximum supported weight, which is just 200 pounds, making it the model with the lowest weight limit on our list of finalists.

All that to say that although this is a remarkable little chair, little is the operative word here. It simply may not be big enough to meet your needs. If it is, you’re going to love what it has to offer, and we’ll look at that next.

L-Track + Dual Rollers

In terms of massage capabilities, this model is built around an L-Track and dual rollers. The L-Track allows your massage to begin at your shoulders and extends down under the seat to massage your glutes and thighs.

In our opinion, this model gives the best overall massage experience of any chair on the market today, under $500. There are a few limitations to bear in mind: