Underfloor heating underlay needs to allow enough heat to pass through to your room without sacrificing comfort and durability. There is little point in choosing carpet over wood flooring or LVT if you have to compromise on these fundamentals. When choosing the best carpet for your home, and the different areas within in, there are several considerations to bear in mind: Although slightly thinner than an ‘average’ underlay at 6.10mm, it offers a density of 495kg/m³, making it one of the most dense and hardwearing products available. Despite this, it has a TOG rating of just 0.75.

The key metric you need to be concerned with here is TOG rating. TOG is a measure of thermal resistance – the higher the value, the less heat that can pass through the underlay. Therefore, with UFH underlay, you should be looking for a low TOG rating of between 0.75 and 1.00. Berber or looped pile products are made from continuous uncut loops on the surface of the carpet, resulting in a distinctive knotted appearance. Wilsons Thermalstream is another excellent option which should be considered if you’re installing an UFH system. This specialist PU foam underlay has holes punctured throughout to allow heat to pass upwards, giving it a TOG rating of 0.80.

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Wool carpets are a great choice for high traffic areas as they have a natural, in-built resilience in the fibres making them perfect for those after the best carpet for stairs," explains Alexandra Hindle from Cormar Carpets. Storage & organisation Furniture Textiles Kitchenware & tableware Kitchens Lighting Decoration Rugs, mats & flooring Beds & mattresses Baby & children Smart home Bathroom products Laundry & cleaning Plants & plant pots Home electronics Home improvement Outdoor living Food & beverages Christmas Shop Shop by room It has a spongy feeling underfoot, making it a genuinely good all-rounder, and is priced extremely competitively, meaning it should be well within your budget for your project. Runner Up: Tredaire Jazz Wool blend carpets are, on the whole, a more affordable option than wool, yet they also come with a range of other benefits. They are highly durable, making them a great option for those after something for high traffic areas of the home, such as entrance halls or stairs. Synthetic carpets

Made with an impressive amount of recycled rubber, it has very little vertical movement, delivering unrivalled stability and support for your carpet. The research demonstrated that a carpet/underlay with a combined thermal resistance of less than 2.5 togs allows underfloor systems to operate efficiently,” explains Lisa Conway from Brintons. Choosing carpet underlayAs well as helping your carpet to sit evenly across the floor surface, underlay adds additional insulation and will help keep heat inside the room. Choosing a good quality product makes all the difference when it comes to the longevity of your carpet, as it will be able to reduce the compression of the carpet and ensure it lasts longer. What size is the space you are carpeting? If you are dealing with a very small space you might want to look at carpets that can help make the space look bigger, for example. Regularly vacuuming not only helps to prevent unwanted dirt from working its way into the carpet fibres but also helps to keep the tufts of the surface upright, maintaining the soft, brand new look for longer,” says Joanna Ramsden from Grosvenor Wilton. The best underlay for your home boils down to your specific needs and budget. Remember: there’s no such thing as the best underlay, just the best underlay for your project.

And if you’re laying underfloor heating (UFH), research carried out by The Carpet Foundation and the Underfloor Heating Manufacturers Association showed that most carpets can be used with UFH without hindering the performance of the system.

Colour

There are numerous manmade options for your carpet too, all of which tend to be highly stain resistant. A loop pile wool carpet can be problematic as its fabric is easily snagged by claws," says Gemma Holsgrove. "A more formal cut pile carpet design is a little difficult to clean when subjected to dirt and damp." Some manmade fibres, like nylon 6.6, offer the same benefits as wool carpets but with better cleaning and maintenance properties,” says Gregory Powley-Lynch, operations director at Elements London.

One of the key benefits of choosing carpet over wood or vinyl flooring is the added sense of warmth it brings to a space. And when combined with an insulating thermal underlay this effect is compounded, leading to reduced heat loss, warmer rooms and even lower heating bills.

Any underlay which can reduce impact noise by at least 42 decibels (dB) can be considered a good acoustic underlay, while any over 45dB are really top drawer. This velvety floor covering is from Elements London’s luxurious Symphony collection . This premium velour product offers a supersoft feeling underfoot and is made from durable Antron nylon. (Image credit: Elements London) What is a carpet's tog rating? The 10mm version meanwhile has a 45dB rating, meaning it’s very much in the top tier of sound reduction. The best underfloor heating carpet underlays