Michael Higham
Premium gaming chairs can easily cost north of $500, and often quite a bit more. At a retail price of $319.99, the Cougar Armor Evo M hopes to undercut the competition and wedge itself among the best gaming chairs without skimping on quality or features. For the most part, Cougar has succeeded, although there are some inevitable concessions to consider before making it your primary gaming or office chair.
Cougar Armor Evo M – Options and Assembly
Unlike chairs from Secretlab, like the Titan Evo for example, with dozens of possible options, Cougar keeps the Armor Evo M simple with a choice of just black with orange accents or black with gold accents. The orange option is slightly bolder, with the accent color found on the chair’s logos, lettering, stitching, wheel rings, and on the outside of the upper backrest. The light gold accent is found solely on the logos, lettering, and stitching, and is the option I chose.
For the price, the Armor Evo M is a surprisingly loaded steel frame chair. The primary material is PVC leather, a synthetic, vegan plastic made from polyvinyl chloride that’s known for its durability, if not its breathability. A retractable footrest and 5D adjustable armrests are included, options that are often extras or not even possible on other far more expensive chairs like the Mavix M9. A magnetic memory foam neck pillow and independent lumbar cushion are also included.
The Armor Evo M ships in a very wide and flat box that weighs around 71 pounds, although the assembled chair ends up at just over 57 pounds. Assembly is a relatively straightforward job that can arguably be completed by one person, but due to the awkwardness of the box and the need to align certain pieces, I found it much easier with an assistant.
The chair is assembled with the included combination Allen key and screwdriver with a handful of bolts, washers, and caps in just six steps thanks in part to certain pieces like the retractable footrest being preinstalled under the seat cushion. About the only area I thought a bit challenging in the build process was lining up the plastic side caps that helped to further secure the backrest to the seat cushion.
Once assembled, I found it to be a nice looking chair that can fit well into most settings, including my casual home office. I particularly like the stitched lines and logos, although I did note that the “Armor Evo M” lettering behind the backrest was uneven, making it a regular reminder of the concessions made for the chair’s aggressive price point.
Cougar Armor Evo M – Comfort and Performance
Gaming chair manufacturers often offer a range of up to three chair sizes to accommodate different heights and weights. The Armor Evo M, in its single configuration, supports up to 352 pounds with no specification for height. While I think the chair could accommodate all but the smallest individuals comfortably, I do get the impression that Cougar errs more on the side of larger body types for maximum wiggle room. For instance with an interior seat width of 14 inches of its maximum 23 total inches as it angles up, and backrest of 11 inches of its maximum 22.5 inches as it angles forward.
I’m just over 5 foot 9 inches with a medium build and found the seat and backrest width to be extremely generous. In fact, the seat depth to the backrest of 20 inches was way too much for me, which is why it’s nice, or perhaps necessary, that the lumbar cushion is included. Without that extra support, I’d have to sit way too far back in the seat to reach the backrest.
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Similarly, the 5D independently adjustable armrests not only move up and down and rotate, but also slide to the left and right, creating more or less room, as needed. They still don’t necessarily go in quite as close as I’d like, but there’s no denying that they’re extremely versatile, and unlike the FS 360-degree rotational arms found on the Mavix M9, these do a good job of staying in place. In fact, they even have an additional trick where the upper portion of each armrest can be tilted up to support your forearms for when you want to use handheld devices. It’s a feature I’ve rarely seen elsewhere and one that works well in unison with the Armor Evo M’s extendable footrest.
While you can use the slide-out footrest in the chair’s regular orientation, it becomes particularly useful when you recline the chair. You can go from the standard 90º upright position to a 155º recline, which, while not perfectly flat, does allow you to recline in a significant manner, great for using XR glasses or simply relaxing.
Of course, as versatile as the chair is, there are some negatives. If you’re expecting the type of luxurious cushioning you get with a Secretlab Titan Evo, forget it. While the Armor Evo M looks the part, the foam cushions themselves are on the firmer, stiffer side. Even the Armor Evo M’s magnetic memory foam neck pillow, despite the name, errs very much on the firm side versus the Titan Evo neck pillow’s marshmallow-like give.
The included lumbar cushion is similarly very firm. I would have liked it to have a bit more give on my lower back. It’s also a bulky 4.5 inches at its thickest, requiring me to slightly recline the chair back to better position it. Finally, I get that you don’t want a lumbar cushion that gets strapped in because of how the chair reclines, but it’s also not magnetic, so would sometimes fall over when I got up.
Although Cougar stresses the breathability of its PVC leather, I found the material can still trap heat, particularly in the seat cushion. If you combine this chair with a headset like the Razer Kraken V4 Pro that also traps heat around your ears, you’ll definitely need a fan going for particularly active gaming sessions.
Lastly, while it’s a solid chair, I do find that if I lean back there’s a bit of a squeak originating somewhere below the seat. It’s not consistent or persistent enough to be a deal-breaker, but is another indicator that to reach the Armor Evo M’s aggressive price point, Cougar had to cut a few corners.
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