Best Flooring For Kids

What type of floor is best for kids?

Safety is always the main concern when it comes to kids. Young children can easily fall over and bang their head on the floor which can be extremely dangerous. The best type of floor for a youngster when they fall over at home is a thick soft fluffy carpet, obviously.

If a toddler falls over and hits their head on stone flooring, wood flooring, laminate flooring, sheet vinyl or luxury vinyl flooring they would be hitting their head on a hard surface which would at least hurt them, and possibly cause serious harm.

If a toddler falls over and hits their head on a soft fluffy carpet however it is unlikely that they will be hurt. A thick soft carpet with thick underlay underneath provides a considerable amount of cushioning.

Young children may stain and ruin a carpet, but the carpet can be replaced. The child cannot.

Is laminate better than carpet for kids?

It depends how young the child is. Carpet is better for very young children as they often crawl on their hands and knees which would be much less comfortable for them on a hard laminate floor. Carpet is a much better surface for a baby to learn to walk on when compared to laminate, with them standing up and falling down, taking a few steps then falling down again. The softer the floor the better for babies and toddlers.

An argument can be made for laminate being better suited to slightly older children who have learnt to walk and don’t fall over as much, as laminate flooring will be slightly easier to keep clean than carpet. The suitability for slightly older children is roughly the same for carpet and laminate however.

Our Partridge Oak Plank LVT Flooring is a premium vinyl floor suitable for all interior rooms

Is vinyl or laminate better for kids?

These two floor types are very similar apart from one important factor, vinyl is waterproof and laminate is not.

Kids often drop food and spill drinks for example, and if they spill enough drinks on laminate over time the spills and the cleaning of the spills will affect the flooring. Whereas they can spill as much drink as they want on vinyl flooring as it is 100% waterproof.

Kids also simply make a mess in general which means floors need to be cleaned regularly. Vinyl and lvt flooring is easier to clean thoroughly than laminate because of the waterproof design. You can get vinyl as wet as you like which makes it easier to disinfect and get stains out of. It is much more difficult to get stains out of a material that you can’t really get wet.

Are vinyl floors safe for kids?

They are now, but they weren’t always.

A few years ago it was discovered that vinyl flooring contained chemicals called Ortho-phthalates which were found to be toxic. Fortunately this was discovered and the government put restrictions on the use of Ortho-phthalates.

Today most manufactures have completely eliminated Ortho-phthalates from their flooring. You can now enjoy the advantages of vinyl flooring worry free.

This means that once again vinyl flooring is considered by many to be the one of the most kid-friendly flooring options available and arguably the best flooring for nursery rooms.

Sheet vinyl, glue down vinyl and lvt flooring are generally considered to be the best flooring for kids and dogs.

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