Best Flooring For Concrete Basement

A concrete basement slab is porous and prone to moisture and water vapor migrating up through the slab.

Best flooring for concrete basement.

Best flooring for concrete basement sealed and polished concrete make unsurpassed floors for your basement. For added protection even though ceramic holds up well against water you can install a water barrier layer between the subfloor and your tiles. First vpf and vtf are impervious to liquid and vapor moisture. Vinyl won t transfer the cold from the concrete which will create a durable and comfortable basement flooring.

In addition to its affordability vinyl flooring offers temperature benefits for basement installation. If you use a plywood subfloor you risk the plywood warping if water does end up reaching it. The best interior concrete sealer is a film forming sealant like epoxy or acrylic. Vinyl plank flooring vpf and vinyl tile flooring vtf are similar to click laminate flooring but they re better in three ways.

If the concrete subfloor is always dry however laminate floors can be placed directly on the slab. Engineered vinyl planks or tiles so first let me say that engineered vinyl planks are usually my first choice flooring for basements because it looks like hardwood flooring and it s waterproof. Although some manufacturers sell engineered wood flooring that can go down over a concrete floor it s better to install this type of flooring over a subfloor. That leaves you a lot of basement flooring options such as ceramic tile engineered wood rubber and laminate flooring made with a moisture resistant plywood core.

If you have a damp basement it is recommended to lay a vapor barrier between the concrete slab and the planks. This matters because even seemingly dry basements can have enough moisture vapor migration to trigger mold growth. The planks themselves won t get damaged by moisture but mildew can grow on the bottom of them. Flooring choices for basements.

Unlike exterior sealants that penetrate the concrete with uv protection while still allowing breathability interior types create a film over the top. But that doesn t mean basements are trouble free. Laminate floors which may be tongue and groove or snap together are floating floors and not attached to the subfloor. Vinyl flooring also known as resilient flooring ranks with concrete and ceramic tile as one of the better basement flooring options.

Many basement concrete slabs are cold underfoot especially during the winter. The best way to install ceramic tile in a basement is directly over a concrete slab. You can install vinyl planks on top of most existing floors including cement basement slabs and the planks are completely waterproof. Vinyl flooring comes in both sheet or tile plank form and there is a subtle difference.