Weight Room Flooring Options and Ideas

As a general rule, rubber flooring is the best product for the floor of your weight room floor. It provides great protection for your sub-floor. It also reduces vibration and can help to cut noise from machines and free weights. Rubber flooring is durable and fairly easy to keep clean. The style and engineering of that rubber material, however, plays the biggest role in how well the gym flooring does the following:

1. Protects The Subfloor
2. Dampens Noise
3. Reduces Vibrations
4. Protects The Athletes Body
5. Maximizes Output
6. Protects The Weight Equipment
7. Resists Bacteria/Mold/Mildew Growth

The most popular thickness for weight room flooring is 3/8 inch. 8mm (which is very similar in thickness) is becoming more frequently used as it is less expensive than 3/8 inch and performs to the same standard. Thicker rubber is usually not necessary unless you are using heavy free weights. For areas where power lifting and repeated dropping of heavy weights take place, 3/4 inch rubber is generally recommended. The thickest option we carry for weight room flooring is 2 3/4 inches.

Rolled Weight Room Flooring

When it comes to economy weight room flooring, it's best to start looking into rubber flooring rolls. These are generally going to be your thinnest options and offer the best price point per square foot. If you've got a small or irregularly shaped weight lifting room, however, you'll find the rolled rubber installation will result in more wasted product as it is cut to fit the space.

Weight Room Floor Tiles

Customization is where interlocking rubber tiles come into play most. Ranging anywhere from 2x2 foot to 4x4 foot, these tiles are much more easily customized. They also have many more engineering options due to the fact they do not have to be thin enough to roll up. Lower cost rubber weight room tiles will generally be flat on both sides and have puzzle style edges. However, as you move up the quality scale, you'll find rubber gym floor tiles with a variety of different support structures on the underside of the tiles that are specifically designed to absorb shock, provide ''give'' for the athlete to reduce fatigue in his/her muscles and joints, reduce vibration, or reduce noise. With the specialty support systems also comes a greater thickness of tile and often times weight of the tile as well. In order to combat that weight factor, most rubber tiles of 1 inch or greater thickness will be 2x2 feet in size.

4x6 Weight Lifting Mats

And then there is also the traditional 4x6 foot rubber mats. The most economical versions usually have straight edges and butt up next to each other. They are typically 1/2 or 3/4 inch thick weight around 100 pounds each. Many people will use horse stall mats of these sizes to save money as they are extremely durable and do a great job of protecting concrete floors from dropped weight from Olympic weightlifting.

The difference you'll find between 4x6 mats that are designed for horse stalls and those designed for weight rooms is the smell. Horse mats usually will have a much stronger rubber odor, while rubber gym mats generally use a lower odor binder in the manufacturing process and/or include an additive to reduce the smell. You'll also find that rubber gym mats will more often have trued edges, meaning they'll fit nicer together than cheap horse stall mats.

Another area where the 4x6 mats differ from rolled rubber and interlocking tiles is that they are more often made of a vulcanized rubber, which does increase the durability at a lesser thickness. It also makes the mats 100 percent waterproof. Non vulcanized rubber, while water resistant can allow some permeation when soaked or pressure washed.

Lightweight Home Gym Flooring Options

If you're looking for a lighter weight gym flooring option, Greatmats does offer a couple of different thickness of super high density EVA foam tiles with a pebble style surface texture. These are great flooring o'>ptions for weight rooms but equipment and weights can leave small indentations in it that may not come out if the heavy objects are left in place for long periods of time. If you are considering foam for a weight room, we recommend that you disperse the weight under the equipment with a coaster of some sort.


Plastic flooring such as our StayLock products are also great for home weight room floors. StayLock is rugged enough to handle the weights and equipment but also provides fatigue relief for athletes. Plus, they can be installed over carpet. We do not, however, recommend dropping weights intentionally on this type of flooring.