Pet Friendly Flooring: How to Choose Flooring for Dogs?

Helen Skeates
Helen Skeates
16 min read

More than six out of ten American households have a pet, but they can be hard on the floor. Here’s a look at some of the most popular types of flooring, and how they might fare in the presence of dogs, cats, and other furry friends, to help you choose the right floor for your home.

Scratching is a major concern when it comes to pets and floors, especially if you don’t keep your pets’ nails clipped. Even if a pet does not intentionally scratch the floor, their mere movement, running or jumping, can leave a mark. They shed and sometimes forget they’ve been housetrained.

But don’t worry, you may still have lovely floors even if you have a rough, furry, and accident-prone pet at home. It’s all about finding the correct one!

Pets and style don’t have to be mutually exclusive when it comes to our long-lasting flooring selections. Some considerations and options to bear in mind if you are looking to buy the finest flooring for dogs or the best flooring for cats

Vinyl

Many pet-owning households choose vinyl flooring over other types of flooring. Water, scuffs, and dents have no effect on the luxury vinyl tile or sheet’s long-term durability and resilience. They’re also simple to maintain, which is a big plus. Vinyl tile is easy to clean, simple to put in, and inexpensive..

Your pet’s claws will walk across the floor more quietly if you have vinyl to muffle their footsteps when they walk across the floor.

Pet-Friendly Flooring Buying Guide

Luxury Vinyl Tile

Luxury vinyl tile is a great option for pet-friendly homes. With Diamond 10® Technology, our ViveroTM luxury flooring line is one of the most resilient products on the market, offering long-lasting durability, easy cleaning, and waterproof planks that will not swell, buckle, or lose their integrity when exposed to water. Read your warranty for specifics. You can have it with the sumptuous appearances of stone or ceramic with a rough surface that not only seems real but also prevents slipping for padded paws.

Vinyl Sheet

When it comes to pet owners, vinyl sheet flooring is an excellent choice. There are few seams and no grout lines in this resilient flooring, yet you can still achieve incredibly realistic hardwood and natural stone types because it is installed on a roll. Armstrong’s DualityTM Premium and CushionStepTM Better collections both feature Diamond 10® Technology, which provides better scratch, scuff, and stain resistance. Cleanup is a breeze with our new protective finish’s soil and spill resistance.

Vinyl Tile

Vinyl tile flooring makes it simple to clean up puppy messes and water bowl spills, making it ideal for households with pets. Having an easy-to-clean surface doesn’t mean you have to give up style. Tiles made of vinyl can closely imitate natural stone and ceramic tile in terms of pattern, color, and style.

Rigid Core

It’s impossible to dent, scrape, or stain our rigid core flooring since it’s completely waterproof, so planks won’t swell or lose their structural integrity when exposed to moisture. Water bowl spills and wet pups will love this!

These floors are not only long-lasting, but they also boast award-winning, on-trend designs that are incredibly realistic. Floors that can withstand the rigors of your family’s daily routine and still look good can be found.

Engineered Tile

To have the look and scratch resistance of natural stone or ceramic tile but with the added benefit of being more pleasant underfoot for your pets, our Alterna engineered tile range is a great option. It’s possible to create the original look and feel of traditional tile while also providing a surface that’s significantly warmer and friendlier to you and your pets, thanks to the 70% limestone content of the tiles.

The stain- and soil-repellent surface of Alterna makes cleanup a breeze, and the sound-absorbing tiles keep the house peaceful even when pets are running around. Additionally, Alterna tiles have a textured surface that is more slip-resistant than smooth ceramic tiles either wet or dry.

How to Love Your Dog and Your Floors

First, a few things should be made clear regarding the finest floors for your dog. Of sure, your dog will spend a lot of time on the floor, but it would be an exaggeration to claim that dogs and floors are best buddies. The reason for this is that dogs are hard on the floor. The floors take a battering from our fuzzy companions’ slobber, muddy paws, and tail-wagging-red-wine tragedies.

Your Dog Doesn’t Have to Crush Your Flooring Dreams

It is always feasible to have the floor of your dreams. In other words, “There’s a way where there’s a will.” Having a dog doesn’t imply that you can’t have a luxurious white carpet in your home. I-couldn’t-make-it-outside puppy accidents will necessitate more time and effort in caring for and cleaning those types of floors.

High-performance fibers in our Rival by Resista carpet range resist crushing, stains, and soiling from muddy paws. Additionally, this carpet comes in a variety of colors and has a 10-year stain warranty with no exclusions. Spills from the dog dish or pet messes won’t seep through thanks to the waterproof backing.

We can’t prohibit you from having the floors of your dreams if they don’t appear to resonate with your dog, as previously said. It is impossible for us to prevent your dog from dragging their own or another dog’s toys across your new carpet. Regardless of how well-behaved or misbehaved your dog is, we have the best flooring for dogs with solutions that require less maintenance on your part while still looking great.

6 Dog-Proof Flooring Options That Will Hold Up to Your Hound

Luxury Vinyl Takes the Cake

As far as dog-friendly flooring goes, luxury vinyl is your best pick because it ticks all the right boxes. Waterproof, scratch and dent-proof, and sound-dampening if the suitable backing is utilized. Luxury vinyl floors have an embossed surface that mimics other flooring types like wood or tile while also providing traction for your dog’s paws during vigorous tug-of-war matches.

Stone Is a Great Runner-Up

Another great alternative for “doggos” is stone flooring. It is scratch-resistant, waterproof, and easy to maintain. Stone flooring makes it less noticeable if your dog is doing something wrong.

Don’t Rule Out Wood Floors

Hardwood floors are both gorgeous and easy to clean. Hardwood species that are more resistant to scratches and dents when your dog accidentally drops a bone down a flight of stairs are also fantastic possibilities. The Janka scale is a great tool for determining the hardness of various types of wood. The more Janka points a species has, the more resistant it is to scratches from pets. The Flooring America professionals would be happy to assist you in selecting the best wood species to keep your dog safe.

The Final Touches for Dog-Proof Floors

In order to further protect your flooring from any messes your dog might cause, sealants and finishes can be placed to your floors during installation. Visit or call your local Flooring America now and speak with one of our flooring professionals to receive all the answers you need about how to best care for your dogs and your floors.

Poured, Sealed Concrete

There are many misconceptions about concrete flooring, but the truth is that it may be an outstanding choice for many homes, especially those with a contemporary design. Concrete can be polished, textured, stained, and chemically treated in a variety of ways to generate a variety of visual effects that work well in contemporary and modern living rooms.

Since concrete is such a hard material, pet accidents are practically impossible to stain. With throw rugs and area carpets, a living room’s roughness can be tamed. If your pets damage any of these items, they can be machine washed or replaced. Concrete floors can seem cold to the touch if they aren’t warmed up by radiant heating systems.

It’s important to know that polished concrete floors can be dangerous to walk on if you have dogs. Slippery floors have been reported to cause hip injuries in some dogs.

Ceramic Tile

Traditional ceramic tile and porcelain tile are fantastic options for pet owners since they are so resilient that even the largest dog’s paws and the sharpest cat’s claws won’t be able to harm them. Glazed ceramics are also impermeable to stains and liquid penetration. To further customize your living room’s look, the glaze can be printed by the manufacturer in a number of motifs and patterns. Pets can discolor grout, but this can be avoided by resealing the grout on a regular basis.

When it comes to ceramics, unglazed ceramics aren’t impenetrable to stains until they’ve been sanded and sealed frequently, making them vulnerable to scratches from pets. Glazed, matt-surface ceramic tiles are the finest choice for pet-friendly houses.

Natural Stone

Ceramic tile has many of the same advantages as natural stone, such as slate. Ceramics are less appealing to certain individuals because they lack the natural beauty of stone. Natural stone can be a long-lasting flooring option for pet owners, but it must be sealed with a chemical treatment to prevent water penetration and stains.

As a precautionary measure, avoid shiny or sharpened materials such as marble and granite, which can scratch under the nails of pets. Slate and limestone, which have a coarser texture, are better choices for natural clefted items. This will help you disguise hair and other trash by using a multi-colored stone.

Cork

In addition to hardwood, natural cork is an excellent option for pet owners because it’s a relatively new flooring option. If you like the look of hardwood flooring but don’t want to worry about it getting scratched or stained, this is a fantastic option for you. Bacteria and mold can’t grow on it either.

Cork is both robust enough to resist scratching and pliable enough to absorb sound. However, it is not scratch-proof, so you should still clip your pet’s toenails. For households with active pets, however, it is a far better option than hardwood flooring.

The best way to keep cork flooring in top condition is to treat it with a high-quality, long-lasting sealant.

Bamboo

Wood-like bamboo is a natural substance manufactured from the processed fibers of bamboo that grows in the wild. To the astonishment of many, bamboo, in many of its forms, is really tougher than most hardwoods. However, bamboo comes in a variety of forms, and the Janka hardness test is a good indicator of the quality of the flooring. In houses with pets, strand-woven bamboo flooring usually holds up the best.

Due to the resins used in the manufacturing process, bamboo is also resistant to moisture and stains. Pet messes are easy to clean up. When your pet walks through bamboo, its claws will make an audible clicking sound. No, this isn’t a noise-canceling floor.

Flooring Materials to Avoid with Pets

Other flooring materials, such as carpet and hardwood, are best avoided if you have a lot of pets because they are easily scratched or stained.

  • Engineered wood flooring uses a scratch-prone surface layer of real hardwood, despite the fact that it may perform better than solid hardwood. For one thing, you can’t refinish these floors like you can with real wood, because the surface layer is quite thin. This type of flooring is prone to pet damage, even if it is beautiful.
  • Plastic laminate flooring, which has the appearance of hardwood and is said to be stain-proof, can be attractive to certain people. Laminate flooring, on the other hand, is more prone to scratching than practically any other hard flooring material because of its surface wear layer. Under the “click-click” of pet toenails, there is also a very noisy flooring. Installing laminate flooring is usually a mistake made by dog owners. Finally, pets’ hips can be injured if they slip and fall on a laminate floor due to its slippery nature. Check selecting luxury vinyl (LVF) instead of laminate if you’re looking for a similar style and greater performance for pet owners.

Choosing Flooring for Dogs: What to Consider

If you know what to look for, you can locate floors that not only look great, but also function well for your dog. There are a few things to bear in mind while deciding on the best dog food for your pet.

  • It is vital to consider scratch resistance when evaluating different floor materials because dogs may do a lot of damage with their nails.
  • It’s important to seek for floors that are water and stain resistant if your dog isn’t potty trained or is more likely to make messes and spills.
  • If you’re a dog owner, you’ll appreciate the ease with which you can maintain your floors.
  • Most dog owners want their pups to be comfortable and safe, and traction is an important part of that. Depending on the sort of floor you have, your dogs will experience different levels of comfort and traction.
  • If you’re looking to improve the value of your house, it’s crucial to pick a floor that’s both cost-effective and aesthetically pleasing.

You’ll be able to limit down all of your flooring alternatives if you keep these things in mind. Read on to examine some of the top dog-friendly flooring alternatives and choose the one that works best for you and your pet.

Types of Flooring to Avoid

If you want to keep your floor looking its best, you’ll need to take adequate care of it and maintain it properly. There’s no escaping filth and debris, pet hair and dander, or regular wear and tear in a home with a dog, so this is especially true. To maintain your floors looking and feeling their best, use the advice in the following paragraphs.

Clean Spills Immediately

Any spills or accidents that occur on your floor should be cleaned as soon as possible to minimize the risk of stains or lasting damage. Your flooring are more vulnerable to water damage the longer water lingers on them.

Trim Your Dog’s Nails Regularly

Your flooring will be less scratched if you keep your dog’s nails cut. The best way to prevent your flooring from being damaged by your dog is to have him trimmed and groomed regularly.

Best Flooring for Dogs - Which Type Will You Choose?

Maintain Your Dog’s Food and Water Area

In comparison to the rest of your house, the area where your dog eats and drinks is probably the messiest. Place mats under your dog’s food and water bowls to keep them from splattering on the floor and causing harm.

Vacuum Frequently and Mop Regularly

It is possible to dramatically minimize the amount of time and effort required to maintain your floors by establishing a simple daily floor cleaning regiment. Pet hair and dander can be reduced by vacuuming frequently, if not daily, and by washing the floors once a week. To make vacuuming easier, concentrate on high-traffic areas when doing daily cleaning.

You can still locate floors you love and that can survive the abuse of having a dog even if no flooring is pet-proof. Even if you have furry pals running about, you can keep your floors looking great with a devoted cleaning schedule. Waterproof flooring and scratch-resistant coatings are just two of the many options available when it comes to flooring.

Our flooring experts are on hand to answer any concerns you may have and provide customised recommendations tailored to your specific needs.

Helen Skeates

Helen Skeates

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