How to tell if your floor is sealed

In my last post, I talked about when and how to use Mop&Glo. Most importantly, it is not recommended for unsealed/worn wood or unsealed ceramic surfaces. *If applied to these surfaces, it can leave spots, streaks, and/or discoloration that can be very difficult and sometimes impossible to remove. 

In this post, I want to help identify these types of floors and how to tell if they are sealed or not. 

Wood
​To tell if your wood floor is sealed, find an inconspicuous area, dab a drop of water on the surface, and see if it soaks in or beads on top. If the water drop beads on top of the wood, your floor is sealed. Surface-sealed floors are stain and water-damage resistant and easiest to clean. Unless the floor is worn, it should be ready for Mop&Glo or other acrylic and wax applications. 

Water beading on a sealed floor.

Top: Sealed, Bottom: Unsealed

Ceramic
Ceramic tile can come un-glazed or glazed. Glazed ceramic tile does not usually require sealant because the glaze itself acts as a seal against general stains. However, glazed or not, unsealed grout could be negatively affected while using a product like Mop&Glo. If you want to make or keep a shine on these types of tiles, make sure un-glazed tile and unprotected grout are sealed before applying waxes or products like Mop&Glo.

Un-glazed Ceramic Tile

Glazed Ceramic Tile

Tile
If the tile has been sufficiently sealed, when you do the bead test, you should see that the water beads up on the surface and will also ‘roll’ across the tile as you blow on it.  If not – then either it has not been sealed correctly, or it requires preparation and re-sealing. As with ceramic floors, the grout also needs to be sealed before using waxing or floor shine products.

Left: Unsealed, Right: Sealed

Laminate
Most laminate flooring is sold already sealed, but it is obtainable in an unfinished state. To tell if your laminate floor is sealed or not, go to an inconspicuous area of the floor (the back of a closet perhaps) and start with the water bead test. If the water soaks in or the floor changes color, it is unsealed. Another way of testing for sealant is to gently scrape a small area with a blade edge or a coin. If you see a bit of clear material on the edge, it is most likely sealed. 

If you do not want to do the bead or scrape test, look for signs like lifting edges at the seams, especially in water-prone areas, such as the bathroom and kitchen. The laminate or adhered wood skin can begin to peel off the manufactured base over time, especially if it was left unprotected and wet.

Water damage on unsealed laminate

Scrape test