6 Laundry Room Flooring Options

Laundry room flooring should be comfortable to stand on, attractive, easy to clean, and functional. If it's stain-resistant and can stand up to the inevitable cleaner spill? Even better. It's also a bonus if it's affordable, durable, can stand up to moving appliances and foot traffic, and still manages to look attractive and cohesive with the rest of your home.

But there's one quality that matters more than anything else. Water resistance. Moisture is a major concern in laundry rooms and preventing water damage is key. Water can come from an overflowing washing machine or a clogged drainpipe. Even short of those emergencies, water is present in laundry rooms from normal activities.

Learn the 7 best types of flooring for laundry rooms, including two types of vinyl flooring, tile, and even concrete. Plus, find out the 5 types you should avoid.

The Best Types of Laundry Room Flooring

Sheet Vinyl Flooring

If the best moisture-proof floor covering for the laundry room is a single, unseamed waterproof piece of material, then sheet vinyl flooring is it. As long as the width of your laundry room remains at or less than 12 feet, you can install a piece of sheet vinyl and avoid seaming altogether since sheet vinyl comes in 12-foot wide rolls. Sheet vinyl will run you between $1.50 and $20.00 a square foot.

Combined with a thermoplastic rubber wall base molding (a type of baseboard), sheet vinyl flooring is a highly reliable waterproof laundry room flooring. As long as the vinyl floor and the wall base molding retain their seal, the floor plus another vertical 3 or 4 inches can contain even minor flooding. It's as close to a watertight basin as you can get.

Sheet vinyl flooring also holds up well to traffic. If it ever needs replacing, you can lay another sheet right over it. As long as the lower floor is still in good condition, it's a perfectly acceptable substrate for another layer of sheet vinyl.

Luxury Vinyl Flooring (LVF)

Luxury vinyl plank, at up to 48 inches long per plank, looks remarkably like real wood from a distance. Rigid, solid core LVF is a beefy 7 mm thick and more closely approximates laminate flooring than earlier iterations of LVF. Luxury vinyl flooring will run you on the higher end of the vinyl flooring range, which is $1.50 and $20 a square foot.

Luxury vinyl is a do-it-yourselfer's dream, but care must be taken to tightly seam the boards on all four sides for the flooring to remain waterproof.

Tile Flooring

Ceramic and porcelain tile are classic laundry room flooring materials since they are durable, easy to clean, and waterproof if installed well. Tile can be hard to stand on for long periods, and it is inherently cold—but this can be eliminated with radiant heating or the addition of fabric or gel mats. Sheet vinyl will run you between $3 and $30 a square foot.

Tile flooring is solvent-proof. Bleach or petroleum-based products will not affect tile flooring.

Tile in the laundry room provides a solid, firm base for the washer and dryer. There is no flexibility with tile or grout.

Concrete Flooring

Concrete might simply be your default laundry room flooring choice because that's what you already have. You don't even have to install a floor covering for it to be a hardy, reliable flooring choice for the laundry room. Concrete will run you between $2 and $8 a square foot.

Improve your concrete floor's look by acid-etching, painting, or staining it. Or add an outdoor area rug to soften it and make it warmer under bare feet.

Laminate Flooring

Laminate flooring has been the mainstay of economical do-it-yourself installations for decades. Laminate flooring will run you between $1.70 and $17 a square foot.

While laminate flooring can be used in the laundry room, it does run the risk of damage in the event of flooding or even repeated minor pooling of water. Even the tiniest amount of water introduced to the base fiberboard core can cause the flooring to swell or delaminate.

Always tightly seam laundry room laminate flooring. Use a pan under the washing machine as a precaution.

Engineered Wood Flooring

Costly but with great looks to spare, engineered wood flooring brings real wood to homes but without many of the difficulties of solid hardwood flooring. Engineered wood's high-quality plywood base is dimensionally stable, which means it is less affected by moisture. Engineered hardwood flooring will run you between $4 and $8 a square foot.

But engineered wood flooring's looks are only skin-deep: the hardwood is just a thin layer bonded to a plywood base. It doesn't take much to damage that top layer. As with other delicate laundry room floors, be sure to use a pan under the washing machine.

The Worst Types of Laundry Room Flooring 

Carpet

Because of carpet's tendency to soak up moisture, mildew, and become severely damaged by water, it's never a good choice for flooring in a laundry room. Even marine grade carpet is not ideal. If you do decide to go the carpet route, expect to pay $4.50 a square foot.

Mosaic Tile

Mosaic tile is not going to be as durable against the heavy machinery involved in a laundry room, making it a poor choice for that space. It could crack or grout lines could become stained, and it won't look good over time. It will also cost roughly $15 a square foot to install.

Bamboo

While bamboo is slightly more resistant to moisture than hardwood, it still has a tendency to warp and expand when exposed to water. With a laundry room's flood risk, it's not worth investing in bamboo flooring, especially at $7 to $20 a square foot.

Marble

Marble as a material can stand up to water and moisture, but it can become slippery, putting you at risk if there's a flood. Additionally, marble stains with water exposure, so if you don't like the patina that comes with the staining and etching, then marble isn't a good choice for a laundry room. You can seal it annually to ward off some staining, but it's not foolproof. Marble will also run you up to $20 a square foot.

Solid Wood Flooring

If solid hardwood flooring runs throughout the house, including the laundry room, it can be made to work—but it's not the best option, despite its attractiveness and resale value. Solid wood flooring will run you between $4 and $29 a square foot, and it can be sanded and refinished rather than replaced.

However, hardwood flooring is not dimensionally stable, and any solid piece of wood can swell and shrink dramatically when subjected to enough water, and solid hardwood flooring is no exception. If flooded hardwood flooring is not addressed quickly enough, it can dry and cup so much that sanding will not fix it. Additionally, it can be damaged by chemicals involved in cleaning laundry. Site-finished hardwood flooring is a better bet than pre-finished flooring because its seams have been filled with sealant.

The Verdict

It's all about preferences and priorities when designing a laundry room and choosing laundry room flooring. Do you want to lean more toward practicality or toward appearance?

• Practicality: If you want a durable but less conventionally attractive laundry room floor, choose concrete, ceramic or porcelain tile, or sheet vinyl.
• Appearance: Tile is a versatile and attractive option that can go with a variety of decor styles.
• Moisture resistance: Sheet vinyl is the most water-resistant material, making it the best choice flooring for wet areas.
• Durability: There's little that's more durable than concrete or sheet vinyl, though homeowners love luxury vinyl flooring since it has the look of hardwood the the durability of vinyl.
• Ease of cleaning: Tile, concrete, and laminate are all tied for the easiest materials to clean.
• Cost: Vinyl is the most affordable type of laundry room flooring, but laminate, tile, and concrete can all be affordable, too, depending on the style and finish.