How to install laminate or vinyl plank flooring: subfloor, gaps and rows
Check that the subfloor is flat and dry, let the cartons sit in the room as the maker asks, put down the underlayment or vapor barrier the instructions call for, then click the rows together with a gap at every wall and the end joints staggered. The floor floats: nothing nails or glues it down.
The instructions in the carton set the numbers, and they differ by product. Pergo’s laminate and its Extreme rigid vinyl both want 48 hours in the room, but the laminate needs a 3/8-inch gap at the walls and a T-molding in every doorway up to 4 ft wide, while the vinyl takes a 1/4-inch gap and no added gap between rooms.
Worked example
Example: one 12 × 10 ft room in 48 × 6 inch laminate planks with Pergo Pro’s gap and end-joint rules, 20 sq ft to a carton and 10% extra.
This example gives 7 cartons by area.
- 120 × (1 + 10/100) ÷ 20, rounded up = 7
- Cut allowance: 70 plank positions with 20 sq ft offcut; no reuse assumed.
Measure and order
Measure each room’s length and width, add the rooms that get the same floor and add the extra your instructions give: Pergo says 10% for a standard layout and 15% for a diagonal one. The laminate and vinyl plank calculators count cartons two ways, by area and row by row, and add a transition strip for each doorway. Buy the trim with the floor: base shoe or quarter round to cover the gap at the walls.
Check the subfloor
The subfloor must be flat, clean, dry and sound. Pergo’s laminate guide allows no dip deeper than 3/16 inch between two high spots within a 10-foot radius, and a slope of no more than 1 inch in 6 feet. Fill low spots with leveling compound and grind or sand the high ones. Pull up carpet, pad and tack strip. Do not sand or chip old vinyl flooring or its glue: Pergo Extreme’s instructions say to presume it contains asbestos unless you know it does not. Pergo recommends a moisture test on concrete and on wood floors over a crawl space or basement, with wood at 12% or less, and does not allow its laminate in a room with a floor drain or anywhere on a level that has a sump pump.
Let the planks get used to the room
Lay the unopened cartons flat in the room where they go. Pergo’s laminate asks for at least 48 hours, 96 hours in a very dry or very humid climate, at 60 to 85°F and 35 to 65% relative humidity, kept that way during and after the job. Pergo Extreme vinyl asks for 48 hours at 55 to 85°F. Other floors give their own wait and temperatures: go by your carton.
Put down what goes under it
Over concrete, Pergo’s laminate goes on a 6-mil polyethylene vapor barrier with the seams overlapped 8 inches; over a wood subfloor it takes none. Planks without an attached pad go on one layer of foam underlayment made for laminate, never two. Planks with a pad attached need no foam, though laminate over concrete still goes on the vapor barrier, and Pergo Extreme with its pad must not go over a separate underlayment.
Click the rows together, with a gap at every wall
Run the planks along the longest wall, with spacers against it. Leave your instructions’ expansion gap at every wall, pipe and cabinet: 3/8 inch for Pergo’s laminate, 1/4 inch for Pergo Extreme, or 5/8 inch where the floor will get warmer than 85°F. Undercut the door casings so the planks slide under them. Start each new row with the offcut from the last. Pergo Pro wants the first piece at least 8 inches long and end joints at least 12 inches apart from row to row; Pergo Extreme wants a random stagger of at least 12 inches and a last row at least 3 inches wide: measure the room first, and if the last row would come out narrower, cut the first row narrower.
Finish the edges and doorways
The trim covers the gap but must not pin the floor: fasten base shoe or quarter round to the wall, never to the planks. Pergo’s laminate needs a T-molding in each doorway up to 4 ft wide and across any room, or rooms joined by a wide archway, over 40 ft long or wide; Pergo Extreme needs no added gap between rooms. Set cabinets and islands first and run the floor around them. Fill the gap with 100% silicone, not acrylic, wherever water can get under the floor: in front of a sink, dishwasher, refrigerator, exterior or sliding door, around water lines and a toilet, and all the way around a bathroom or laundry room.
Look after it
Wipe up spills: Pergo counts water left more than 30 minutes as standing water, which its laminate must not have. Never use a steam cleaner on Pergo Extreme. Put felt pads under furniture and soft wheels on chair casters, and keep a few spare planks for repairs.