There are many different types of flooring solutions for the home. One the one hand you will find hard flooring that includes hardwood floors, marble and stone flooring for example, and on the other hand, carpets.

Each room in a house has a different set of requirements, depending on the use. The bedroom and the kitchen have completely different usages and this should be reflected on the type of flooring you decide to place there. The decision of using a carpet in any particular room should follow this initial definition.

Carpet, being in essence a soft floor, has certain characteristics:

1. Both carpet tiles or wall to wall carpet (that comes in rolls) are softer to the foot step. Hard flooring on the other hand is not. A simple description of the differences is when you look at an example. Just mark the difference between standing for hours on a concrete floor as compared to a soft carpet.

2. The carpet industry, as well as being huge, is also at the forefront of new designs, styles, textures and hues o colors. This makes it a very versatile type of floor cover for most interior decorating requirements.

3. Another set of benefits of carpet is that the room temperature is more easily maintained providing not only greater comfort but also reducing heating expenses. Additionally one of its characteristics is that carpet acts as a noise absorber.

There is a large selection of types of carpet you can use in your home, but you also have carpet tiles and carpet rolls. One of the obvious differences between these two is that in tiles you will need less than for a traditional carpet. And the reason is that there is much less excess carpet needed to cover the area. In short, less waste.

Another great advantage of carpet tiles relates to installation. A carpet roll is heavier, longer and more difficult to move about and when installing it has to be stretched. Carpet tiles are placed side by side and also many residential tiles (Legato from Milliken for example) have the adhesive included in the backing.

Carpet tiles come in boxes that are easier to carry, much more practical to store and maneuver. Carpet rolls are quite the opposite.

Carpets will wear out eventually or become stained. Typically the areas that suffer from this the most are those with higher traffic. When having to replace wall to wall carpet, you have to remove the full sheet of carpet. Carpet tiles are much more practical where you only have to remove the affected tile and replace it. This also means it is always a good idea to have a few square tiles in stock.

For residential usage carpet tiles are becoming increasingly popular as they have tremendous design possibilities, they are easy to move about and store and in case of repair the simple tile replacement benefits make for longer lasting enjoyment.

Some of the advantages of carpeting are as follows:

1. Carpet tiles and the traditional wall to wall carpet are soft to the touch (feet or otherwise). A hard floor, as the word implies, is not and this does make a difference in the home. For all those thousands of people who enjoy walking barefoot the difference is patently obvious, but at the same time for everybody, the tread provoke less impact to the body.

2. Although now days all types of flooring have a good selection of colors and styles, carpet that is made from yarn, has a much wider variety of colors, designs and textures that make it very flexible from an interior decorating point of view.

3. They provide temperature and sound insulation, both of which are looked for at home or in the work place.

When you compare carpet tiles and carpet rolls, the first thing that is patently obvious is that there is much less waste in tiles because of the different sizes. Rolls are made "x"yards long but the width is 12 feet and up. Tiles come in a range of sizes that go from 18 inches to 36 inches (in some cases 1 meter). When it comes to installation, and remembering that rooms come in different sizes and shapes, it is much easier to fit a 36 inch carpet tile than a 12 foot carpet roll. In both cases excess material needs to be taken into account, but in general a rule of thumb will be 2% additional carpet tiles, and between 8 and 12% carpet roll. This has an obvious effect in costs.

Capet tile installation is much easier and this makes it perfect for a DIY job. The squares are placed side by side and in most residential carpet tiles they have self adhesive as part of the tile. This also means you can combine different tiles allowing you to design your own patterns.

Carpet tiles come in boxes that are easier to carry, much more practical to store and maneuver. Carpet rolls are quite the opposite.

carpet tiles a easy to install and this also means that if an area of your carpet is damaged you can easily replace the tiles with new ones - an important tip is to have a few spare tiles for potential replacements.

Carpet tiles are an excellent choice for your home carpeting, not only due to their design possibilities, but also there is less waste, can be installed easily, stored and replaced.