How to lay laminate flooring

Inspired by a helpful YouTube guide. This walkthrough draws on the popular Wickes tutorial "How To Lay Laminate Flooring", which covers both the Rapid Fit and Twin Clic systems clearly and at a sensible pace. Worth watching before you open the first box — the section on leaving expansion gaps alone the walls is easy to skip and easy to regret.

1. Leave the boards to acclimatise

Stack the unopened boxes flat in the room where they will be fitted and leave them for at least 48 hours. Longer is better. Laminate boards are made of compressed wood-based materials that expand and contract with temperature and humidity changes, and a room that feels dry in December may be quite different from the same room in August.

Do not stand them on edge or pile them near a radiator. Flat on the floor, in the room. Simple.

2. Prepare the subfloor

The finished floor is only as good as what is underneath. Walk the subfloor and listen for creaks. Screw down any loose floorboards to the joists below — laminate over a bouncy board will cause problems with the click joints over time.

Fill any gaps or dips deeper than about 3mm. On a concrete subfloor, use self-levelling compound. On timber, use a flexible floor filler. The surface needs to be clean, dry, and flat before you start.

3. Lay the underlay

Underlay does three jobs: it absorbs minor imperfections in the subfloor, it cushions footfall noise, and it acts as a moisture barrier on concrete. If your boards come with underlay pre-attached, you do not need a separate layer — adding one will make the floor feel spongy and may affect the click joints.

Butt the underlay sheets edge to edge rather than overlapping. Tape the joins. Keep it clear of the walls so it does not bunch up when the boards go down.

4. Plan your starting position

Measure the width of the room and divide by the width of one board. If the final row on the far side would be less than half a board wide, shift your starting row so it ends up wider. Thin strips of board along one wall look amateurish and are harder to cut neatly.

Also consider the direction of the boards. Running them parallel to the longest wall or toward the main source of natural light tends to give the best result. Mind you, in a narrow hallway, running them lengthways along the hall is nearly always the right answer whatever the light does.

5. Lay the first row

Start against the longest straight wall. Use spacers to maintain a 10–12mm expansion gap between the boards and every wall — the floor needs room to move slightly with humidity changes. Do not be tempted to run tight to the wall; the skirting or beading will hide the gap later.

Lock the short ends of the boards together as you go, tapping gently with a pull bar. Keep the row straight. If the wall itself is not straight, scribe the first row to follow the wall rather than forcing a wonky start.

6. Continue across the room

Stagger the joints by at least 300mm from row to row — use off-cuts from cut boards to start alternate rows. Most manufacturers recommend a random stagger pattern rather than a regular one. It looks more natural and distributes stress across the floor better.

Use a tapping block on the long edge to close each row up snug without damaging the click mechanism. A rubber mallet is gentler than a hammer here. Work in manageable sections and check the rows are still square every few metres.

7. Cut and fit the final row

Measure the remaining gap, subtract your expansion margin, and rip the final boards to width with a jigsaw or circular saw. This row often needs individual boards measured separately because walls are rarely perfectly parallel to each other.

A pull bar is essential here. You cannot swing a tapping block in the gap between the last board and the wall, so the pull bar lets you close the click joint from the exposed face side.

8. Fit beading or replace the skirting

Remove the spacers and fit matching laminate beading or refit the skirting boards to cover the expansion gap. Fix beading to the wall, not to the floor — the floor needs to move independently. A bit of decorator’s caulk along the top of the beading gives a cleaner finish.

Around door frames and between rooms, use a threshold strip to bridge the gap neatly.

When to call a handyman

If the subfloor needs significant levelling work, old boards need lifting, there is a damp issue in a concrete floor, or you need boards fitted around awkward shapes like curved bays or kitchen islands — give Richard a call. Also worth getting help if the room is very large, very odd-shaped, or you want it done quickly without the weekend of faffing about.