Percko Lyne UP review: does this viral posture t-shirt actually work?

Until I tried the Pecko Lyne Up vest, I thought I had quite a normal posture. I definitely have some bad habits that don't help: I sit at a desk for long periods throughout the week and am a sucker for a prolonged scroll on my phone. All this slumping over my laptop or Tik Tok and not sitting up straight at my desk is surely detrimental to my posture.

Even though I didn’t consider myself to have bad posture, I knew it can be improved. As it turns out, I wasn't alone. According to a recent study, 73% of Brits are unhappy with their posture, with 60% of those surveyed admitting to sitting in a slouched position while working at a desk. This is where Percko comes in.

It’s created a posture vest to help remind people to engage and vary their posture throughout the day. The patented medical vest is made with elastic technology to sort your posture and fix back pain. On first hearing of the shirt, it seems too good to be true, but could this £99 vest be the answer I was looking for? We put its Lyne Up vest to the test.

Percko Lyne Up Vest 

If you want to try Percko for yourself and see if it can improve your posture, you can get the Lyne UP (as tested in our review) for £99, and currently, Percko is offering 25% off a second shirt with your first order. 

• Buy the Percko Lyne Up Vest at Percko, £99

First impressions: an inconspicuous undershirt

Despite being called a vest, the Lyne Up top looks and feels like a t-shirt. It arrives in a small cardboard package which can fit through the letter box and is accompanied by detailed instructions. These guide you through the best way to wear the vest, how to tighten it, and answer some frequently asked questions.

On opening, my first impression was that the vest wasn’t something you’d describe as ‘fashionable’ and looked like a mix between sportswear, thermals, and Kevlar. Luckily, this bulletproof vest-looking shirt is designed to be worn underneath your clothing. So, unless you plan on removing your outerwear in public (please don’t), the aesthetics don’t really matter.

The vest is made from two synthetic fabrics, and the best way to describe its texture and feel is that of a Speedo swimming costume. There are seven sizes to choose from based on height and weight. Even though the material that the vest is made from is very adaptable and can be scrunched into the size of a fist, it proves hard to get on.

First wear: a tight fit, but that’s the point

The next step in my quest for posture perfection was getting the vest on. This proved to be the trickiest part of my daily re-alignment experience. On a typical day, the process involved pushing and pulling to get the vest into its required position. The most strenuous part of this process was attempting to fit my arms through the sleeves.

On average, taking the vest on and off took between thirty seconds to a minute. If I were tired or had sore muscles from a training session, the tedious process would take longer and quickly become frustrating. I found this one of the most discouraging parts of wearing the vest, but despite my struggles with getting into the Percko top, the vest had to be this tight. Without such compression, there was no chance of changing your posture or benefiting from long-term improvements to back pain and alignment.

The vest's tightness is key to keeping your muscles and back straight. It means your body is constantly contained and lightly compressed, ensuring you’re in the optimal upper-body position to achieve posture enlightenment. A bonus of this tightness is the discretion it allows. It’s almost impossible for anyone to notice you have a vest underneath your clothes. The tightness is pretty annoying, a struggle, but a necessary evil.

Design and features: adjustable elastic to help you sit up straight

When I first heard about the vest, I thought it would work by keeping you in a rigid position and forcing you to stand straight, but this isn’t the case. Instead, the vest uses elasticated tensor technology to encourage you to engage and vary your posture throughout the day.

It basically acts as a reminder to sit or stand up straight, as the elastic pulls on you when you’re not. If you are correctly aligned, you won’t know the shirt is on.

One of the key features of the vest is the adjustable clip near the bottom, where your stomach is. This is used to tighten up the vest, and the clip is attached and adjusted similarly to how a bra is. As your posture improves, you can tighten the strap to add more pressure to the vest and help you straighten up more.

As well as reminders for your posture, Percko promise that the elastic technology helps to open the diaphragm, realign the spine, strengthen core muscles, and alleviate back pain. I have never experienced back pain, so this benefit is slightly redundant, and I can only judge the others.

Longevity and functionality: how well does it wash?

Percko's promises of positive posture results don’t mean anything if the vest doesn’t stand the test of time. A big indicator of this longevity is how well it washes. This is an area that I think Percko does very well. The vest is easily washable, can go in a regular washing machine on any setting, and can be hand-washed. You just have to make sure the water doesn't go above 30C!

The two fabrics the vest is made from, polyamide and elastane, can’t be ironed or put in the tumble dryer. However, neither of these is a problem. You don’t need to iron the vest as it doesn’t crease easily, is black, and goes under your clothes anyway. Not being able to put it in the tumble dryer doesn’t matter, as the synthetic fabrics dry extremely quickly.

The vest dried and was wearable within two hours after removing it from the washing machine. This was inside on a clothes horse, and when I put it on the line outside on a sunny day (I know, rare in England), it dried in under an hour.

I washed the vest after every two days I wore it, and there was never any difference in sizing after any of the washes. The shirt kept the same shape throughout the period I wore it, which, to me, signals that it’s designed to last a long time.

Performance: does the Percko shirt work?

The vest is great for reminding you to straighten up and does help your posture because of this. Percko has some pretty specific instructions regarding how to get the best out of it, and they advise continuously wearing it five days a week for three weeks. You should then move down to wearing the vest twice a week.

I wore it for the suggested amount of days for an average of around 6-8 hours. For me, the vest served as a healthy and polite reminder to stand up straight. It was the nudge I needed to re-align myself and was much better than being told to ‘stand up straight’ or ‘stop slouching’ by a family member, partner, or, god forbid, a stranger.

I made wearing it a consistent habit by sticking to a routine of sporting the vest for 6-8 hours a day. Although my waking day usually consists of 16 hours, I found that wearing the vest for more than eight hours a day wasn’t comfortable and was a target I couldn’t keep to. Like with all habits, consistency is key, and I had to choose a reasonable goal of wearing it based on how it fit around my personal life.

Typically, I would don the vest whilst working from home and on the weekends, often wearing it in chunks of 4 hours. I stopped wearing it in the office as I felt it was uncomfortable underneath a collared shirt, and it became too hot when worn with anything long sleeve (jumpers, jackets etc.).

Also, when I was exercising or taking part in any sort of sport, I didn’t wear the vest and wouldn’t put it back on afterwards because I either had to go straight to work, was going to bed (or simply forgot).

There was one exercise I still wore the vest whilst doing – walking. When out with the dog or myself, I wore the vest under a t-shirt. This means most of the time I had the shirt on was either whilst working from home, out walking, and relaxing during the weekend; watching football, meeting friends, or chilling on the sofa etc.

Results: did the Percko shirt improve my posture?

After all those hours wearing the shirt (I estimate between 100-140 hours in total), the results were positive. I feel like my posture has improved, and if I’m standing up straight, my core strength feels better due to the vest constantly reminding me to realign myself. I am now more inclined to sit up straight when working on my laptop and find myself stretching out my back and reconfiguring my posture when out and about.

My posture has definitely improved, but it is hard to determine just how much the realignment technology has worked as I have no base level to measure this against.

In terms of drawbacks, the main one was the heat the shirt created. Being so tight meant I got pretty hot when walking around. The tightness of the shirt meant it became uncomfortably sweaty and made me reconsider wearing the shirt when I knew I’d be moving around a lot that day, wearing smart or long-sleeve clothes, or if the weather was warmer than usual.

Results: Is the Percko vest worth the money?

The Percko Lyne UP costs £99, and with that comes the promise of long-term back improvements, posture improvement, and even pain relief. I believe it has helped my posture, and I am now standing up straighter. My core feels stronger, and I think well aligned. The vest definitely helped to do this. I am more conscious of my posture and am regularly realigning myself.

The price should reflect the result, so if you feel you need to improve your posture, I think £99 is a fair price to pay for an improvement that will, hopefully, last a long time.

That said, before buying the shirt, it’s important to consider how comfortable you think you’ll find it, whether you can wear it all year round, and if you can commit to wearing it long-term. In the summer, I can imagine it is uncomfortably sweaty, making it more difficult to commit to wearing the shirt and forming the habit of wearing it.

I work an office job, but you might not want another stick-causing layer if you are on your feet all day or working outside. Also, the fact it was so difficult to put on means I wouldn’t recommend anyone with severe joint or muscle pain to even attempt to squeeze it on as it takes a serious wriggle to get into.

Overall, the vest is helpful in reminding you about your posture and encouraging you to straighten up. I feel my posture is better, which is the aim of the shirt, so it’s done its job. If improving your posture is a priority, the Percko Lyne UP is a worthwhile investment.

• Buy the Percko Lyne Up Vest at Percko, £99

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