PP vs Nylon vs PNMIX Carpet Tile: A Specification-Level Comparison

1. The three yarns, and what the catalogue says

Most fibre comparisons are written in the abstract: here is nylon, here is polypropylene, here is polyester, choose wisely. That is not how a specification decision actually goes. You are choosing from what a given factory can supply, and the shape of that factory's range tells you more than any generic table.

So here is ours, counted from the live catalogue rather than described in adjectives. The range runs to 92 products across 32 series, in 764 colourways, and it splits by yarn like this:

Two things worth reading off that table. First, PP is a remnant, not a pillar — nine products, and eight of them are not even organised into a named series. Second, PNMIX is not a side experiment: at 37 products across 15 series it is very nearly the equal of nylon in catalogue weight. Where a factory puts its design effort is a reasonable proxy for what it expects to sell.

You will also notice what is missing. There is no pure polyester tile in the range. PET is in the catalogue, but only blended with nylon inside PNMIX. The reasoning is covered in section 5; the short version is that the factory judges the step from pure PET to the blend to cost about 15% more and to buy a disproportionate gain in durability and underfoot comfort.

2. The specification comparison

The table below is UNIJOY's own material specification, translated from the factory's comparison sheet. Read it with one qualification firmly in mind, stated here rather than buried in a footnote:

These are manufacturer specification figures, not third-party test results. They are what the factory commits to and what it uses internally to position the three yarns. They are not measured values from an independent laboratory, and this article does not present them as such. The one exception is emissions, which is documented by the CRI Green Label Plus certificate listed in the sources. If a figure is going into a tender document, ask for the test report behind that specific construction.

3. Resilience: the number that decides year three

If you read only one row of that table, read the resilience row. It is the widest gap between the three yarns, and it is the one most often misunderstood at specification stage.

Buyers tend to worry about wear-through — the fibre physically abrading away. In commercial interiors that is rarely what ends a carpet's life. What ends it is appearance retention: the pile in the traffic lane lies down, stops recovering between footfalls, and develops a visible sheen that no cleaning removes. The tile is intact. It simply looks worn, and it looks worn in a stripe down the middle of the floor where everyone walks.

Recovery is what resists that. Nylon is specified at 80–90% recovery after compression; PP at under 30%. That is not a marginal difference in degree, it is a difference in behaviour. A PP pile that recovers less than a third of its height is, in practical terms, taking a permanent set in the first year of a busy corridor.

This is also why the service-life figures diverge so sharply — six years and above for nylon against roughly three for PP. Those numbers are not describing when the tile falls apart. They are describing when it stops looking acceptable in a space where clients and staff see it every day.

A practical consequence for tile selection: the higher the traffic and the more uniform the colour, the more resilience matters. A plain mid-grey tile in a main corridor shows crush and sheen far sooner than a multi-tone patterned tile in a cellular office. Pattern and colour variation buy you tolerance; they do not buy you recovery.

4. Fire class: B1 is a gate, not a grade

The fire row deserves separate treatment because it does not behave like the others. Resilience, colourfastness and cost are trade-offs — you can decide how much of each you are willing to give up. Fire class is not a trade-off. It is a threshold, and you are either over it or you are out of the project.

In the Chinese classification, B1 is the level commonly required for interior finishes in offices, hotels, retail and other public buildings. UNIJOY specifies PP at B2 and states that it cannot reach B1. Nylon and PNMIX are both specified at B1.

The practical effect is that for a large share of commercial work, the yarn decision is made before anyone opens a price list. PP is not a cheaper option for those projects. It is not an option at all.

What to ask for, and what we are not claiming here. B1 above is a manufacturer specification. This article deliberately does not cite a fire test report number, because a test certificate applies to a specific tile construction — yarn, backing, pile weight and thickness together — not to a yarn in isolation. If your project requires documented fire performance, ask for the report covering the exact construction you are specifying, and check the issue date. That is a reasonable request and any serious supplier should be able to meet it.

5. Where PNMIX sits, and why it exists

PNMIX is UNIJOY's own blended yarn: PET and nylon spun together. It exists to answer a question the first two columns cannot, which is what to do when a project genuinely needs B1 and commercial-grade durability, but the budget will not carry a full nylon specification.

The factory positions it as follows:

• Fire class B1 — the same threshold as nylon, which keeps it eligible for the offices, hotels and public spaces that PP is excluded from.
• Colourfastness equal to nylon — the specification puts it level with nylon rather than between nylon and PP. For phased fit-outs where tiles are added from later batches, this matters more than it first appears.
• Resilience close to nylon — not stated as an equal, and the honest reading of the specification is that nylon remains the benchmark at 80–90%.
• 30–40% below nylon on material cost, and roughly 15% above pure PET. That second figure is the more interesting one: it is the premium the factory asks to turn a budget polyester tile into something specifiable for commercial work.

Whether that trade lands well depends entirely on the project. For a headquarters floor with a fifteen-year outlook, nylon's resilience is worth paying for outright. For a multi-floor commercial fit-out on a fixed budget where B1 is mandatory, PNMIX is doing something neither of the other two yarns can.

6. Choosing: three questions in order

The order matters. Asking them in the wrong sequence is how projects end up re-specifying late.

• First: does the space require B1? If yes, PP is out, and the choice is between nylon and PNMIX. Settle this before looking at any prices, because it removes an option rather than adjusting one.
• Second: how long must this floor look good? If the answer is six years or more, the specification points to nylon. If it is a shorter-cycle fit-out, or a space where the interior will be refreshed before the carpet is worn, PNMIX covers it.
• Third: where is the traffic concentrated? Resilience is not needed uniformly. A common and defensible approach is nylon in corridors, lift lobbies and open-plan circulation, with PNMIX in cellular offices and meeting rooms — both are B1, and the tiles can be selected to sit together visually.

PP earns its place only when B1 is genuinely not required and the holding period is short — light-specification and residential work, which is what the specification sheet says and what the nine-product catalogue position reflects.

7. What this comparison does not tell you

Yarn is one variable among several, and a comparison at yarn level has real limits. In the interest of not overselling the table above:

• The backing is a separate decision, and it is not a minor one. The same yarn is supplied across five different backing systems in this range, and backing drives dimensional stability, acoustic performance, installation method and a meaningful share of the cost. A nylon tile on one backing and a nylon tile on another are not interchangeable products.
• Construction variables are missing here. Gauge, pile weight, pile height and total thickness all move performance within a single yarn type. A heavyweight PNMIX tile can outperform a lightweight nylon one in service.
• Most of these figures are manufacturer specification. Stated once more because it is the thing most likely to be quoted out of context: apart from the CRI-documented emissions position, these are the factory's own numbers. Ask for test reports for anything contractual.
• No prices appear here on purpose. The cost figures are relative — PNMIX against nylon, PNMIX against PET. Absolute pricing depends on construction, quantity and destination, and a number published on a website would be wrong for most readers of it.

Where a yarn-level comparison genuinely does settle the question is at the two extremes: when B1 is mandatory, and when the floor has to still look right in year six. Those two constraints eliminate more options than any other pair, and they are the reason the catalogue looks the way it does.