Toyota's $3,500 Crown office chair puts heated seats and USB charging at your desk
Toyota has turned an actual Crown sedan seat into a luxury office chair — complete with heating, ventilation, power recline, and a USB charging port where the seatbelt buckle used to be. Built in collaboration with Japanese office furniture maker Itoki, the chair costs 495,000 yen (roughly $3,500) and is limited to just 70 units worldwide.
The seat, reinvented
The Crown office chair carries over everything that made the original a premium automotive seat. Power height adjustment, lumbar support, and a full recline mechanism are all present. Seat heating and ventilation — features you'd normally pay extra for in a top-trim sedan — come standard. The repurposed seatbelt buckle now hides a USB charging port fed by an onboard battery; Toyota hasn't disclosed the battery's capacity or how long it lasts before needing a charge.
At its price point, it goes up against the likes of Herman Miller, Steelcase, Humanscale, and Haworth — all of which offer four-figure ergonomic chairs. None of them, however, can claim automotive engineering as a foundation, or offer built-in thermal comfort as a standard feature rather than an add-on.
Japan only, for now
The chair sells exclusively through THE CROWN premium retail network in Japan as part of Toyota's "THE CROWN COLLECTION." There are no announced plans to bring it to the US, UK, or any other market. If demand in Japan exceeds the 70-unit run, a lottery system will determine who gets one, per Carscoops.
The move is a calculated one for Toyota Boshoku, the Toyota Group subsidiary that handles interior components. The global ergonomic office chair market was valued at over $10 billion in 2024 and is growing at roughly 6–7% a year, driven by remote work and workplace wellness spending. Tapping that market with existing automotive-grade materials and engineering is low-hanging fruit — even if the first product is a 70-piece collector's item rather than a mass-market launch.
Worth watching
Whether Toyota or Itoki expand beyond this initial run remains to be seen. For now, the Crown chair is a proof of concept that automotive luxury and office ergonomics aren't mutually exclusive — it's just that getting one will require either a trip to Japan or a very competitive lottery entry.
