LMC Tech
Problem solved
The keyboard gets the blame. The mouse usually did it.
Tingling fingers, an achy forearm and a sore wrist. What causes it, what actually helps, and what is marketing.
The problem
What is actually going on
Your wrist aches, your forearm feels tight, and sometimes your fingers tingle. It is worse at the end of the week.
- Holding a standard mouse means rotating your forearm so your palm faces down. That is not a neutral position, and holding it for hours is what a lot of people are actually feeling.
- Standard keyboards force your wrists outward to reach a straight row of keys. Small angle, held all day, adds up.
- Wrist rests are widely misunderstood. They are for resting between bursts of typing, not for parking your wrists on while you type. Pressing the underside of your wrist into a surface while working compresses exactly the wrong spot.
- Arms set too high on your chair also show up as wrist and forearm pain, because you end up reaching and tensing your shoulders. Worth checking before buying anything.
- Genuine warning: persistent numbness or tingling, especially at night, is worth a GP appointment rather than a shopping trip. Ergonomics helps discomfort, it does not treat nerve compression.
The fix
What helps, roughly in order
Cheapest and most effective first. A surprising amount of this costs nothing at all, which is not what most sites selling you things will tell you.
- Fix your chair and desk height first. It is free, and it is frequently the whole answer.
- A vertical mouse keeps your forearm in a handshake position rather than rotated flat. Of all the ergonomic kit here, this is the one people most often report an immediate difference from. Expect about a week of feeling clumsy.
- A split or tented keyboard lets your hands sit at shoulder width and a natural angle. A bigger adjustment to learn, but effective for people typing all day.
- A trackball if the pain is more shoulder and upper arm, since it removes the repeated arm movement entirely.
- Take actual breaks. Nothing you buy compensates for six hours without moving.
- Skip anything sold purely as 'ergonomic' with no adjustment and no change in posture. The word is not regulated.
Refurbished
Buy input devices new
Buying used is often the best value in tech, and occasionally a terrible idea. Which one it is depends entirely on the category.
Amazon Resale store- Keyboards and mice are hands-on items with switches that wear, and they are cheap enough that used rarely makes sense.
- The exception is high-end mechanical keyboards, where used examples are plentiful and switches can be replaced. Not the place to start if you are in pain, though.
Honesty note
How to actually find refurbished stock.
Worth knowing, because it is not obvious and we checked: you cannot filter an Amazon search to refurbished items from a link. We tried every documented approach and each one quietly returned ordinary new products instead.
The used and refurbished offers live on the individual product page, under the buying box, as "Other sellers" or "Used" options. Find the item you want first, then look there. The Amazon Resale storefront above is the other way in.
Who is telling you this
We fix this sort of thing for a living.
LMC Tech builds websites, software platforms and AI-readiness work, and supports the technology behind them. These pages exist because we answer the same questions repeatedly, and writing them down is quicker than repeating ourselves.
- Our work and portfolio, including Time Out Recovery, Echo Moon Western and LODORi.
- Web and software development: Django platforms and custom builds.
- IT support: the day job behind these opinions.
- Browse all guides.
- All the problems we have written up.
Rather not do it yourself?
We can just sort it.
Across Lincolnshire and remotely. If you would rather someone specified it, fitted it and made sure it works, that is the day job.