Luxury vinyl plank is four layers doing four jobs
Luxury vinyl plank is a printed image sandwiched between a protective coating and a structural core. There is no wood in it. Understanding the stack is the difference between buying a floor and buying a picture of one.
From the top down: a urethane coating that handles scuffing, then a clear vinyl wear layer measured in mils, then a high-resolution print film that carries the oak or travertine look, then the core that gives the plank its stiffness and dimensional behaviour, and finally a backing or an attached pad. Every argument about LVP quality is really an argument about two of those layers: the wear layer and the core.
SPC and WPC, the two rigid cores
SPC stands for stone plastic composite. It is limestone powder and PVC, compressed dense and thin. It barely moves with temperature, it resists denting extremely well, and it stays flat. It is also hard and acoustically bright, so a room with SPC and no rugs will sound like a room with SPC and no rugs.
WPC stands for wood plastic composite, though the wood content is flour, not fibre. The core is foamed, which makes the plank thicker, warmer underfoot, quieter and considerably more forgiving of a subfloor that is not perfectly flat. The trade is compressive strength. Put a refrigerator leg or a piano castor on WPC and you will get a dent that does not come back.
Flexible vinyl still has a place
Before rigid core existed, luxury vinyl was a flexible plank glued straight to the substrate. It has not disappeared, and it should not, because glue-down flexible vinyl solves problems rigid core cannot: it tolerates heat and direct sun, it never floats, and it can be spot-replaced a plank at a time. It just demands a substrate close to perfect, because a flexible plank telegraphs every ridge and trowel mark underneath it.
Overall plank thickness is the number salespeople lead with, and it tells you almost nothing about longevity. An eight millimetre plank with a six mil wear layer will wear through the print long before a five millimetre plank with a twenty mil wear layer does. Ask for the wear layer in mils, in writing, and ignore the rest of the spec sheet until you have it.
Reading a wear layer rating
| Wear layer | Built for | Where it fails |
|---|---|---|
| 6 mil | Spare bedrooms, closets, low-use rentals, a short-horizon flip | Any room with a dog, a school run or a chair that gets pushed back twenty times a day |
| 12 mil | The sensible residential default: kitchens, living rooms, hallways, basements | Retail entrances, commercial corridors, anywhere grit gets tracked in constantly |
| 20 mil and above | Light commercial, offices, rentals turned over often, homes with large dogs | Nothing, other than your budget and a slightly firmer feel underfoot |
Mils are thousandths of an inch, which is why the numbers look large next to the millimetre figures on a hardwood wear layer. They are not comparable units. Twenty mil is roughly half a millimetre.
Rooms where LVP wins, and the two where it does not
Kitchens, mudrooms, laundry rooms, basements, bathrooms, hallways, rental units and whole-home installs on a slab. If a room has a plumbing fixture or a door to the outside, LVP is usually the shortest path to a floor that stops being a worry.
Basements are where it separates itself from everything else. A concrete slab gives off moisture vapour continuously, and that vapour destroys wood-based floors from underneath. A rigid vinyl core does not care. We still moisture test the slab, because adhesive and underlayment do care, but the plank itself is inert.
The exceptions are heat and sun. A floating vinyl floor in a sunroom, a conservatory or a room with unshaded floor-to-ceiling south glass will expand where the sun lands and contract where it does not, and the result is peaking at the seams or a gap that opens every afternoon and closes every night. The second exception is anywhere a heat source sits directly on the floor. Direct sun through glass can push a surface temperature well past anything the product was tested at.
Floating click or glued down
| Consideration | Floating click | Glue-down |
|---|---|---|
| How it holds | Planks lock to each other and float free of the subfloor | Each plank is bonded to the substrate |
| Subfloor demand | Flat, but tolerant of minor texture | Flat and smooth, because every imperfection reads through |
| Heat and sun | Sensitive, needs shading and expansion space | Far more stable, the usual answer for sunny rooms |
| Heavy fixed loads | Cannot be pinned by cabinetry or an island | No restriction, the floor is not moving anyway |
| Repairs | Unlock back to the damaged plank, or cut and re-lock | Cut out and replace a single plank |
| Feel and sound | Slightly hollow unless the pad and subfloor are right | Solid, quiet, closest to a tiled floor underfoot |
| Removal later | Lifts out cleanly | Adhesive residue has to come off the substrate |
How we install it
Most vinyl failures are installation failures wearing a product's name. Three steps decide the outcome.
Flattening, not levelling
A rigid plank does not follow a dip in the floor. It spans it, and the click joint over that void carries every footstep until it fails. So we straightedge the substrate and correct anything outside tolerance with patch or a self-levelling compound before a single plank is opened. Note that flat and level are different things: a floor can slope consistently and still be perfectly acceptable. It is the local humps and hollows that break joints. What that correction involves is covered on our subfloor preparation page.
Moisture testing and the vapour question
Concrete gets tested before anything goes over it. Relative humidity probes tell us what the slab is actually doing, and the result decides whether a vapour retarder or a moisture-mitigating adhesive is needed. Skipping this is cheap on the day and expensive eighteen months later.
Layout, acclimation and the perimeter gap
Material sits in the room long enough to reach its working temperature, because a plank installed cold and then warmed will grow. We dry-lay to spread pattern repeats and shade variation, set the starting row against the sightline that matters rather than the wall that happens to be nearest, and hold an expansion gap around the entire perimeter and around every fixed obstacle: pipes, posts, door jambs, hearths. Long runs get an expansion break rather than a hopeful continuous field.
A floating floor has to be free to move as one sheet. Anything with real weight on it, full-height cabinetry, an island, a heavy built-in, pins the floor at that point and forces the movement out to the edges, where it shows up as a buckle or a gap. We run floating floors up to the toe kick, not underneath the boxes. If cabinets are already in and the floor has to run under them, that is a glue-down job.
What actually damages it
Not water. Three things: heat, grit and point loads.
Heat is the big one, covered above. Grit is the quiet one. Sand and street dirt act like abrasive paper under every footstep, and the wear layer is finite. An entry mat and a weekly vacuum extend the life of a vinyl floor more than any product upgrade you can pay for.
Point loads dent, especially on WPC. Hard plastic castors on office chairs, unfelted metal furniture feet, and appliance legs all concentrate weight onto a few square millimetres. Use wide, soft glides. Also worth knowing: rubber-backed mats and some rubber wheels can permanently stain vinyl, and no cleaner reverses it.
Maintenance is genuinely simple
- Vacuum or sweep regularly. Grit is what wears the surface, not foot traffic itself.
- Damp mop with a neutral pH cleaner. Skip wax, polish, oil soaps and anything that promises shine, because they build a film that dulls unevenly.
- No steam mops. Forcing hot vapour into the seams is how water gets to the subfloor on a floor that is otherwise waterproof.
- Felt pads on furniture legs, wide soft castors on chairs, and a proper mat at every exterior door.
- Blinds or window film on the rooms that get punished by afternoon sun.
Specs worth settling before you order
Plank format changes a room more than the colour does. Wider and longer planks read calmer and show fewer seams; narrower formats read more traditional and hide subfloor imperfection slightly better. Ask how many unique board images the product uses, because a short pattern repeat is instantly visible across a large open plan and cannot be fixed after the fact.
Edge treatment is next. A painted micro-bevel defines each plank and disguises tiny height differences at the joint. A square edge reads as a continuous surface but is unforgiving of any lippage. Attached pad is a convenience, not a specification: it makes the floor slightly quieter, and it means you cannot choose a better underlayment separately.
Indoor air quality is worth a question, since vinyl is a plastic product installed across your whole ground floor. Ask whether the product is phthalate-free and whether it carries a recognised low-emissions certification such as FloorScore. Both are category-wide standards rather than one company's marketing, and reputable products state them plainly.
When we would point you elsewhere
If the room is dry, above grade and you want a floor that can be sanded back and refinished in fifteen years instead of replaced, hardwood is the better long-term asset. If you want a harder, more scratch-resistant surface at a similar price and the room never sees standing water, laminate beats vinyl on wear. For a bathroom you plan to keep for thirty years, or any sunroom, tile removes the heat and moisture questions entirely. And in bedrooms, where warmth and quiet outrank durability, carpet still does something no plank does.
Seeing all five side by side is usually faster than reading about them one at a time, so start at the flooring comparison. When you are ready for numbers on a specific set of rooms, tell us what you have and we will scope it. If there is an existing floor to deal with first, our floor removal service covers the tear-out, and flooring installation covers how the job runs from measure to trim.
Questions we get about LVP
What is the difference between SPC and WPC?
Both are rigid cores, and both are waterproof. SPC is stone plastic composite: dense, thin, extremely dent resistant, very stable, and hard and loud underfoot. WPC is wood plastic composite with a foamed core: thicker, warmer, quieter, more forgiving over a subfloor that is not perfect, but softer under point loads. If the room has heavy furniture, choose SPC. If comfort and sound matter more, choose WPC and use wide glides.
How thick should the wear layer be?
Six mil for a spare room or a rental turnover. Twelve mil for a real family home with pets and traffic. Twenty mil or more for commercial spaces and entrances. Wear layer is measured in mils, thousandths of an inch, and it is the only layer protecting the printed image. Total plank thickness affects feel and stability, not lifespan.
Is it really waterproof?
The plank is. A rigid core will not swell, delaminate or rot no matter how long water sits on it. The assembly is another matter, because water that finds its way through the seams reaches the subfloor and stays there. LVP shrugs off a spilled bucket or an overflowing bath. It does not make a slow leak under a dishwasher harmless, so fix the leak.
Why does the subfloor have to be so flat?
Because a rigid plank does not bend into a dip, it bridges it. The click joint sitting over that void absorbs the full load of every footstep, and joints are not designed for that. It shows up as separated seams, clicking noises, and eventually cracked planks. Flattening is the single largest predictor of whether a rigid core floor still looks right in year five.
Can LVP go in a sunroom or over radiant heat?
Sunrooms are the most common LVP failure we get called to, so treat direct sun as a disqualifier for a floating installation unless the product is specifically rated for it. Radiant heat is different and usually fine, as long as the system stays within the temperature limit the manufacturer sets and gets brought up to temperature gradually rather than switched on hard after installation.
Can it go over my existing floor?
Sometimes. Rigid core can float over sound, flat, fully bonded material such as existing tile or sheet vinyl, provided the height at doorways and under appliances still works and no grout joints are deep enough to telegraph. It cannot go over anything cushioned, loose or hollow-sounding. Carpet always comes out. We check it on site rather than guessing from a photo.