Right now running 18" apes, hands are an inch or so above my shoulders, very comfortable.
Last king I ran stock bars and thought the were fine, definitely got some shoulder discomfort on the right after a few hours, nothing advil and stretching couldn't help. Now that I've run apes for 10k miles, I have no idea how I did stock bars for 100k.
BTW law in Florida is hands no higher than shoulders.