5 Different Types Of Sliding Doors & How To Choose The Right One For You

Sliding doors have become a popular design and functional element of modern architecture. More homeowners are opting for sliding doors over other types of doors. There are dozens of reasons why you will also love them, from the different types of sliding doors to the comfort and accessibility they offer. This article has been carefully put together to help you learn how to choose the best sliding door for your needs.

What is a sliding door?

Sliding doors are doors that are pushed horizontally or sideways to open. Unlike the hinged or pivoting door, whose door leaves are attached to the side with hinges, the sliding door is guided at the top or bottom. As a result, it cannot be closed or opened.

Types of sliding doors

There are different sliding doors based on how they are made, what materials they are made of, how they move, and how flexible their fittings are. Below are some notable sliding doors available today.

Patio sliding door

As their name suggests, these big sliding doors made of glass are used to separate rooms from patios. By turning a wall into an open space, the goal is to make a smooth transition between the inside and outside.

Given that these doors must contend with the outdoors, they are far more durable than the others on our list and keep the outside at bay.

There’s nothing better than being able to move easily from your living room to your patio, which makes both spaces bigger. Sliding patio doors are ideal for this use. Sliding patio doors have a very simple way of working, which makes them easier to use and less likely to need repairs than bi-fold doors.

Sliding patio doors are better at making a seal, which may help you save money on heating and cooling your home. You can double-glaze the glass, which can also help you save money on heating and cooling.

Sliding patio doors still occupy half of the entryway when completely opened. Because one door panel is fixed and the other is movable, you have less control while opening the area. This makes it harder to create a real indoor/outdoor space, and some might say it’s not as stylish or useful as bi-fold doors.

Bi-Fold doors

The bi-folding doors come with many door panels, which, when opened, overlap and fold onto each other. The juncture at which the door panels meet is equipped with rollers, which make the door open as it slides and folds in a concertina-like manner.

The bi-fold door type might be a wonderful choice if there is room for the panels to stack at one end of the entryway. When the door panels fold down, they take up less space in the entryway. This is good for big indoor and outdoor spaces because it makes the entrance take up less room and makes it look like the inside and outside are one large space.

Bi-fold doors are sometimes fairly costly because of their intricacy and size. The bi-folding door’s mechanism is a bit more complex than a sliding door’s. The extra cost varies according to the number of panels, doorway size, and panel size. Bi-folding doors have several hinge points, which can be dangerous for little fingers, which is another potential problem. With bi-fold doors, there are a lot more potential spots for an unfortunate event to happen than there are with traditional sliding doors, where the only major risk point is where the door meets the frame.

Pocket Sliding Doors

Sliding pocket doors glide out of sight into a wall recess. Besides a wall broad enough to hold the pocket, the wall on which the door will be installed must also be wide enough to accommodate the door when it is completely opened. Though these compartments are often placed during the construction of a new house, it is possible to retrofit an existing structure with one.

For a tiny dressing room or bathroom, pocket cavity doors are a great option because of their small footprint. A standard hinged door would cut into the area, making it more difficult to walk around and maybe even affecting where you could put things like chairs and other conveniences. Since pocket doors are hidden inside the wall, it looks like there is no door at all. Instead, it is just a sliding wall panel that can be moved to show or hide a door.

The major problem with pocket doors is that they don’t seal as well as hinged doors or other types of sliding doors. Sounds, odors, and light may more readily flow from room to room because of this. Because of this, you can’t use a hollow door to divide an interior from an outdoor area, for example.

Bypass Siding (Barn) Door

Bypass barn doors are often used to save space, which is usually the same reason hollow doors are used. Doors with bypass bars are different because the way they slide isn’t hidden in the door frame.

Bypass barn doors are much more unique and often serve as a statement piece, which is why both homeowners and architects like them. The sliding door and the space it is in have an industrial and utilitarian vibe to them because of the sliding door roller mechanism. Although this style is undoubtedly not for everyone, bypass barn doors can be the ideal choice if you’re searching for something a little distinctive.

The door may also be completely removed if you’d want to because the mechanism is visible and the roller rests on top of the track. Although you might not think to do this very often, it provides you with the option of making your house more accessible for an occasion or gathering.

Bypass doors do not perform an excellent job of sealing off rooms, much like pocket doors do. Since the bypass door slides on the outside of the door frame, they leave a correspondingly sizeable space between the door and the door frame, enabling unrestricted passage of air and sound between rooms. Therefore, rather than using them to split up different rooms, it could be preferable to divide a broader area.

Stack sliding door

Sliding doors that stack on top of one another when opened are known as stacker sliding doors. Although each panel is smaller and moves along its track, these doors use more panels than a typical sliding door. Because of this, the stack of panels is much thicker when completely extended than a typical sliding door.

The major benefit of stacker doors over regular sliding doors is that you have more alternatives. You have more control over light, circulation, and how open the space feels thanks to the door’s increased opening range.

Being easy to configure is another benefit of stacker doors. The central panel can be fixed, while the other panels can slide on either side, rather than having the door attached to one end of a door frame. This opens up a lot of new design possibilities, which may be appealing when building a new house because it lets you creatively use space without giving up functionality.

These doors need more room to be installed since there are more door panels and each has its track. Not every room will have enough space to support three to six panels placed on top of each other, depending on their thickness.

Each of these door kinds has a special function and may be a wonderful addition to your home. Regardless of the door you choose for your house, be sure to select a high-quality sliding door roller so ‌your new door will work flawlessly for many years to come.

How to choose the right sliding door

Sliding comfort and accessibility

Basically, “sliding comfort” should always be the focus of the planner; high-quality hardware technology is required here. Keywords here are, for example, smooth running, closing, and opening at the push of a button, as well as gentle closing with a soft-close mechanism.

A sliding door can be opened and closed either manually or automatically using electrical, hydraulic, or pneumatic systems. An electric drive is almost indispensable, especially for larger and heavy external sliding doors. Even with young clients who can still operate their sliding doors without assistance at the moment of installation, the motorization should at least be checked and‌ prepared to avoid or minimize subsequent conversion work.

This also applies to the barrier-free design of the threshold. In terms of sustainable building, an age-appropriate situation is to be strived for, which can also endure in the later years of the residents’ lives.

Consider the material used

Sliding doors are mainly made of wood, glass, plastic, and metal. Material mixes are also used. Which door material is ultimately chosen depends on the intended use of the sliding door, because the material determines the essential properties of the sliding door, such as weight, visual protection, transparency, soundproofing, thermal insulation, sun protection, burglary protection, etc.

What to look out for in interior sliding doors

Depending on whether internal sliding doors are used in the normal living area or the object area, the demands placed on them differ.

In the commercial sector, the focus is on special requirements for resilience, hygiene, safety, and accessibility. There is always the question of sound insulation, because‌ of the design, a simple sliding door offers less good sound insulation than a normal interior door – especially if it runs in front of the wall and the distance between the wall and the door acts as a sound passage. There are now many doors that have special circumferential seals, for example, and thus meet the minimum building law requirements of DIN 4109 in a wide range of applications, e.g. B. between corridors and overnight rooms in accommodation facilities or between corridors and patient rooms or treatment rooms in hospitals.

What to look out for in exterior sliding doors

Compared to interior sliding doors, there are different requirements for exterior sliding doors. Heat and weather protection in particular, but also burglary protection and accessibility, play a major role here.

External sliding doors are often large, glazed sliding doors that open onto the balcony or terrace. A trend towards slimmer profiles and larger glass surfaces can be observed with these doors.

For a seamless transition between inside and outside, special measures are required to ensure proper drainage at the same time.

As far as thermal insulation is concerned, modern external sliding doors can even achieve passive house standards. This is ensured by thermally broken profiles, insulators, and heat-insulating seals in combination with the appropriate insulating glass.

Regarding security and burglary resistance, up to resistance class 2 (RC2) is possible ‌ through the use of material-stable profiles or lockable, anti-rotation, and anti-drill locking devices.