Flooring grade
Also called NWFA grade, NOFMA grade, Clear, Select, No. 1 Common, No. 2 Common
An appearance classification for finished flooring. The standard states outright that all grades are equally strong and serviceable in any application.
The NWFA/NOFMA International Standards for Unfinished Solid Wood Flooring, revised April 2018, grade a finished board on how it looks and on nothing else. Its governing sentence is unambiguous: appearance alone determines the grades of hardwood flooring since all grades are equally strong and serviceable in any application.
For oak the ladder runs Clear, Select, No. 1 Common, No. 2 Common, with each grade’s permitted characters published in detail — Clear still allows up to 3/8 inch of bright sapwood along the full length. For hard maple, beech and birch the top grades are Special Clear and Select & Better, and colour is graded as heavily as defect.
The practical consequence is that choosing No. 2 Common is an aesthetic decision, not a compromise on the floor. The NWFA itself describes it as most desirable where numerous notable character marks and prominent colour contrast are wanted.
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- NHLA gradeA hardwood lumber grade set at the sawmill by how much clear material a board will yield when cut up — not a statement about a finished floor.
- Clear-face yieldThe proportion of a board’s face that will produce clear cuttings of a stated minimum size — the measurement an NHLA lumber grade is built on.
- HeartwoodThe darker, denser inner wood of a tree, no longer conducting sap — the part most flooring grades are written around.
- SapwoodThe paler outer wood of a tree, still conducting sap when the tree was standing. Permitted, limited or required depending on the grade.
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