From best to worst – 8 bathroom flooring options.

There are so many things to consider when it comes to the flooring in your bathroom but one thing sticks out more than any other, moisture. You have to consider the fact the more often than not, you’ll be walking into your bathroom bare foot. Aesthetics are obviously important but sometimes it can be better to trade this for comfort and ease of use.

8. Carpet

So you’ve got a classy cream carpet thing going on and the house looks fantastic. It only seems logical to extend this to the bathroom right? Wrong. As said before, moisture is a key thing to consider and bathrooms have this in abundance. Moisture and carpeting go together like chalk and cheese, or whatever other horrible combination you can imagine. If you simply must have carpet, be prepared regular cleaning.

7. Glass Tile

An often picked option, glass tile comes in a large number of styles. However, if you don’t fancy regular trips to A&E thanks to its naturally slippery nature, avoid this.

6. Solid Hardwood

Similar to the carpet thing, hardwood can look great but can be a bad choice for a bathroom. Whilst it may feel nice and warm underfoot, moisture is the killer here. If you’re going to get a hardwood floor for your bathroom, make sure it’s perfectly installed and has no gaps to attract moisture.

5. Laminate Flooring

Manufacturers call the resin-impregnated paper atop a wood chip base the ‘wear layer’ and generally it’s surprisingly durable. What you lose in authenticity you gain in moisture repulsion, but one slight crack and the wood beneath will swell and the only way to fix it is to tear it all out.

4. Engineered Wood

With a plywood base to hold up against moisture, engineered wood performs better than its solid counterpart. It’s cheaper but still looks great thanks to the top layer of real wood.

3. Stone

Stone is one of the most expensive options. This being said, stone eliminates the moisture problems of other flooring materials whilst at the same time looking amazing. However, stone can be pretty cold and is quite a shock to the system in the middle of a freezing, wintery night mission to the bathroom.

2. Tile or Sheet Vinyl

For one of the most cost effective means of flooring your bathroom, you can’t do much worse than vinyl. Easy to install and with thousands of styling options, vinyl is something many homeowners opt for simply because it’s just so effective. Moisture is rarely a problem here and its cheap cost means it’s easy to replace if, after a while, it starts to come up.

1. Ceramic Tile

The grandmaster of flooring options, ceramic tile represents everything a bathroom should be.  Ceramic is stylish, moisture resistant, reasonably inexpensive and consistently attractive. There are so many options that and you can find tiles that represent stone. It can still be cold, but heated tiles can largely mitigate this problem.