Monitor arms have a unique advantage because some types can hold more than one screen, so we can have two or three screens side by side or stacked.

Using a monitor arm with two or more screens has been shown to help us work more quickly and make fewer errors.

Looking at monitor usage over a 15-year period, researchers² found that people working in all kinds of roles were improving their productivity by an average of 42% through using dual screens, and that users made 33% fewer errors when they switched from one screen to two or more.

They also discovered that the use of two monitors was growing year on year, by an average of 10%.

The reason for this increased use is because when we only use one screen, most of us find ourselves switching between the document we’re working on, to emails or our browser, which leads us to lose focus.

Looking away from the page we’re on to research something online, or reply to a message, takes time and attention away from our core task. Most of us know that once our concentration is gone it can take several minutes to regain it.

Trying to combat this by fitting two windows side by side on one screen, or repeatedly switching between windows on one desktop, is less likely to help and probably consumes more of our time than we realise.

Dual or triple monitor arms can eliminate these problems and help us work more productively because we can see all our information across two or three screens at once, without needing to switch between tasks.

When we have two or more monitors, much more of the information we need is in front of us, so we don’t need to move away, mentally, or practically, from our ‘core task’ to find something else.

Being able to change the position and setting of our computer screens quickly and easily brings another advantage – and that’s collaboration.

Most workplaces actively encourage collaboration, face to face and remotely, as a way of developing teamwork, sharing learnings and workloads, distributing responsibilities evenly and building motivation.

When we’re in the office with other team members, face to face desk meetings can be an important part of our day, helping us to touch base, understand what each other is doing on a project, and negotiate and communicate.

It’s very usual to pop over to another workstation for a chat and show each other the contents of our screens when we’re discussing a project or reviewing a task.

With a monitor arm this becomes much simpler. Rather than someone needing to lean or hunch over to see our screen, we can quickly adjust it so that they have an easier view.

Monitor arms with gas spring technology are particularly useful here because they allow us to simply pull our screen to the desired position where it will stay until we move it back into its original position.

Monitor arms free up valuable desk surface space because they attach to the back of our desk, or the wall, and hold our computer screen at the right height above our desk. This gives us more space for storing essential accessories and stationery, and a clearer desk.

Eliminating or keeping clutter to a minimum is important because a disorganised physical environment³ is said to significantly influence our thinking, emotions, and behaviour, and can affect our decision-making.

Monitor arms often also include cable management, keeping cables out of the way and off the desk, so contributing to safe workplace cabling.

Health and safety advice for cabling is that this should be minimised, and plugged in as close to the equipment it supports as possible, so that every workstation is using the shortest possible stretches of cables.

Those cables that are essential to the running of a workspace, such as keyboard, mouse, ethernet and power cables, need organising and storing so that they don’t contribute to general desktop clutter or create a trip hazard