LVT Flooring is the only type of flooring that can be bent, folded, or rolled up. LVT flooring can be laid on old tiles, slightly uneven concrete floors, and in rooms where solid wood and engineered wood floors are prone to warping or cracking.
The decor film is the same across all four. What changes is how the plank is backed and how it goes down on the floor. Most buyers pick the wrong one first, then find out after the first container.
The original LVT format. A thin, flexible plank — usually 2.0–3.0mm total — is bonded to the subfloor with full-spread adhesive. The floor becomes part of the substrate, so it doesn't move, expand, or shift. This is the format commercial contractors have used for decades in hospitals, airports and retail.
The catch: once it's glued, it stays glued. Removing and replacing it means scraping, adhesive removal and floor prep again. That's fine for a 10-year hospital refit; it's a bad choice for a rental apartment where the tenant might want to change the look in three years.
If your customer is a commercial contractor, this is the only format they'll accept. Residential buyers usually don't want it — they hear "glue" and think permanent, and they're right.
A rigid LVT plank — usually 4.0–5.0mm — with a milled click profile on all four edges. Planks lock to each other and the whole floor floats over an underlayment. No adhesive, no nails, no subfloor penetration. This is what most residential buyers want today.
The trade-off: because it floats, the floor has a slight hollow feel underfoot compared to dryback, and a heavy load like a full bookshelf can make it shift slightly. For residential living rooms and bedrooms, neither is a problem. For a hotel corridor with luggage carts, dryback is still the safer choice.
Click LVT + IXPE underlayment is the single best-selling combination we ship. If a buyer is unsure, we default to this and ask questions later.
A thicker, heavier plank — usually 4.5–5.0mm — designed to stay down by friction alone. No adhesive, no click, no underlayment. You place the planks, they grip the subfloor, and they stay put. Replacing a single damaged plank takes about thirty seconds.
This format is popular in retail showrooms and short-term rental properties where flooring needs to be replaced or reconfigured quickly. The limitation is that it requires a very smooth, non-slip substrate — a rough or dusty concrete slab will let the planks slide.
We don't recommend loose lay for large residential projects. Once the novelty of easy replacement wears off, buyers realize the planks shift when furniture is moved.
A thin LVT with a factory-applied adhesive covered by a release film. Peel the backing off and press the plank down. This is the cheapest LVT format we produce and the easiest to install — no tools, no underlayment, no waiting for adhesive to cure.
The honest limitation: peel-and-stick LVT is designed for 5–7 years of service, not 15. The adhesive is pressure-sensitive and can lift at edges in high-moisture rooms or in rooms with big temperature swings. If a buyer is looking at a 15-year floor, we steer them away from this format even though it's the cheapest one we sell.
If a customer asks for "the cheapest LVT you have," this is it — but tell them the realistic lifespan upfront. It's easier to sell them a 5mm click floor and have them come back in three years than to sell them peel-and-stick and have them unhappy in eighteen months.
Total thickness is what buyers ask about. Wear layer thickness is what actually determines lifespan. A 4mm plank with a 0.20mm wear layer will wear out faster than a 3mm plank with a 0.50mm wear layer, because the top layer is what takes the abrasion.
Protects the decor film from sun fade. Cheap LVT skips this or applies a coat too thin to measure. It's the first layer to fail — you see it as a yellow tint or a dull patch in front of a window after 12 months.
The number that matters. 0.20mm for bedrooms and light residential; 0.30mm for standard residential; 0.50mm for retail and hospitality; 0.70mm for hospitals and airports. Below 0.20mm we don't produce — the plank fails within two years and comes back as a complaint.
High-definition printed wood or stone pattern. EIR (embossed in register) matches the surface texture to the printed grain, so knots and grain lines actually feel raised. Non-EIR LVT has a generic texture stamped over the film, which looks fine in a photo and obviously wrong in a room.
Virgin PVC blended with limestone and stabilizers. This is what gives LVT its flexibility. If the core uses recycled PVC or too much filler, the plank becomes brittle at low temperatures and can crack when a heavy object is dropped on it in a cold room. Our core is 100% virgin PVC.
IXPE foam, EVA foam, or a fiberglass reinforcement layer. IXPE is worth the extra cost — it doesn't compress flat after two years the way EVA can. On dryback LVT the backing is usually a fiberglass mat that prevents the plank from stretching during installation.
LVT flooring is often advertised as "suitable for any room." However, this isn't entirely true. While it works in most rooms, there are some that are less suitable. Here's a real-world overview of LVT flooring suitability, from best to worst:
We produce all three. Here's the actual difference in one table — not the marketing version:
| LVT | SPC | WPC | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Core | Flexible PVC + limestone | Rigid limestone + PVC | PVC + wood flour foamed |
| Flexibility | High | None | Moderate |
| Feel underfoot | Softer, warmer, closer to real wood | Hard, closer to tile | In between — warmer than SPC |
| Subfloor tolerance | Needs smooth substrate unless dryback | Bridges 3mm over 2m | Similar to SPC |
| Water resistance | Waterproof core | Waterproof core | Waterproof core |
| Underfloor heating | Up to 27°C (click only) | Up to 27°C | Up to 27°C |
| Installation | Glue, click, loose or peel | Click only | Click only |
| Best for | Realistic look, warm feel, retrofit over tile | Bathrooms, basements, commercial, humid climates | Higher-end residential where foot feel matters |
| Relative FOB cost | Mid | Mid – high | High |
Most buyers get this wrong on the first order. One email usually saves a container.
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