[jameskilton]

The research is pretty clear. Any amount of time sent standing is better than that amount of time sitting. Your muscles stay in use, your heart works more efficiently, and you burn more calories, than sitting. So no, sitting + walking breaks is not healthier than always standing.

Cost shouldn't be a factor if you really care about treating your body better. It's super easy to ad-hoc your own standing desk for free, or spend some money to get something built for standing. Remember, if you're doing it for 8+hours a day, that's 1/4 of your life. It's worth the money you spend.

[quaffapint]

Interesting. I sit, but I get up a lot and run around with the dog, etc. I wonder if standing really would make a difference in my case. I could imagine if you were working in an office all day, it might be a problem. Though I wonder if standing too much has its own troubles too. Maybe thats why the desks that easily go up/down would be nicer - that way never too much of one thing - standing or sitting.

[MrDom]

This study[0] shows that it takes about 4 hours of complete inactivity to see a large decrease in LPL (lipoprotein lipase) in the legs. It then takes about 4 hours of low intensity activity to replenish previous levels.

Of course, then the question becomes how much low intensity activity do you need during the day to offset sitting. If you avoid sitting for 4 hours straight, do you avoid most of the bad parts? Is standing alone enough low intensity activity to keep your LPL going or do you need a treadmill desk? Could you go 3 hours sitting, 1 hour walking, repeatedly and still have good LPL levels?

The research is only clear on one thing: don't sit for 4 hours straight. It'll take 4 hours of walking around for your LPL levels to recover.

[0]: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12815182