Table of Contents
If we were only talking about aesthetics, the Ogawa Active L massage chair would score a 10/10. Take a look at it and tell me it’s not one of the best looking chairs you’ve ever seen!
Looks aside, how does this bad boy actually perform? We’ll be looking at all of this throughout the rest of this post, but for now…..who the heck are Ogawa and what business do they have selling massage chairs anyways!?
The Ogawa Active L comes equipped with 2D rollers. Let’s look at how 2D rollers function!
2D rollers are the most basic of all roller technology. They function as follows: the rollers move vertically along the length from neck to back and vice versa, the rollers can also move horizontally from one side of the back to the other. It’s called 2D because of the 2 dimensional horizontal and vertical movements.
As far as rollers are concerned, that takes care of one half of the equation. The other half we need to talk about is the track.
Roller track describes 2 things:
The other 2 technologies are S-Track and L-Track. SL-Track is essentially a combination of both of these.
Airbags or air cells as most people like to call them, are simply empty pouches that fill with compressed air. Airbags have 2 main purposes:
The Ogawa Active L has a total of 44 airbags located pretty much everywhere on the chair. The animation below shows the airbags in green.
With the Active L, Ogawa have gone for an optimized approach. They opted to reduce the number of airbags, valves and motors, while still maintaining a large compression coverage on the body. This reduction in airbags, valves, motors, makes for a low power consumption, and a less noisy chair.
Pre-programmed modes are essentially automatic massage routines that one can access directly from the remote control. The big benefit with auto modes is they save you time. With auto modes, you don’t need to fiddle around with manual settings trying to determine the optimum conditions for massage.
No fussing around, just the way I like it! The Ogawa Active L has 9 of these auto modes. These are gentle, relax, vigorous, neck and shoulder, lower back, glute therapy, stretch, demo, and spine care.
The above 9 modes can be easily accessed from the touch screen remote control.
Note: The Ogawa Active L can perform a total of 7 different massage techniques. These are shiatsu, Swedish, kneading, clapping, tapping, dual action, and rolling.
Zero gravity is simply a recline position where the heart is at an elevated position relative to the feet. A lot of research has been done around zero gravity, and mostly all indicate the numerous benefits one can experience when sitting in this position. Benefits such as improved circulation, less stress and strain on the spine, expanded lung capacity etc.
In the above illustration, you can see both stages 1 & 2. Stage 2 is the one that’s much further reclined (almost like you’re horizontal!).
The Ogawa Active L employs multiple spinning rollers to massage the bottom of the feet. These mechanical rollers move from the heel all the way right up to the toes. If you suffer from plantar fasciitis, this sort of massage could provide some much needed relief!
Airbags work in conjunction with the rollers to provide a thorough massage on all areas of the feet. The rollers take care of the bottom, the airbags take care of the sides and top by compressing downwards.
Note: If the massage is too strong, you can always adjust intensity to suit your needs. This is especially important when you’re just starting out.
If there’s one section of this entire review post you must read, it’s this! The comparisons presented in the table below will give you a good understanding of how the Active L stacks up. We will be comparing the Active L to 2 different chairs.
One of the most popular massage chairs you can find in 2019! This fairly recent release from Osaki has taken the market by storm. As we’ll see in the comparisons, it’s eerily similar to the Active L, but with one major distinction…..$$$$! That’s right the Pro Maxim is significantly cheaper!
It may be an older chair in terms of when it was released, but it’s an absolute steal for what it can do! Cheaper than both the Pro Maxim and Active L, Titan’s Pro 8400 will give an incredibly comforting massage without burning a hole in your wallet!
Note: The above are only the key differences between all 3 chairs. The remaining differences, in my opinion do not impact my overall recommendation, which is why they have been omitted from the table above.
The moment you’ve all been waiting for.
With the comparisons above, hopefully you can see why I feel this way. The Pro Maxim offers a longer track (47”) with pretty much the same features as the Active L, but at a lower cost. That being said, my final recommendation is as follows:
If you decide to buy a massage chair (any of the 3 discussed above) using the links in this post, I will earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Why am I telling you this? No reason really. I feel the review would be incomplete without this disclosure. If you think I deserve it, feel free to use my links. If otherwise, I completely understand.
If you have any questions about this chair, or any other for that matter, please do not hesitate to drop me a comment. Otherwise, I hope you enjoyed reading and got some value. If so, please consider sharing this on the social platforms!
Ogawa Active L massage chair images used from Ogawa website.
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