Doors

Doors: More Than Just Something You Open and Close

Doors do a lot of quiet work in a home. They define the boundary between spaces, control sound, light, and temperature, contribute to security, and — more than most people consciously register — set the visual tone of rooms and the exterior of the property. A well-chosen door in good condition reads as a sign of a cared-for home. A door that sticks, rattles, or simply looks tired does the opposite, and it does it every single time you use it, which is many times a day for as long as you live there.

The door market covers a wide range of products: internal and external, solid and glazed, traditional and contemporary, standard and bespoke. The right choice depends on the role the door needs to play, the style of the property, and the performance requirements around security, fire, sound, and thermal efficiency.

Internal Doors

Internal doors are primarily about aesthetics and acoustic privacy, with fire performance required in specific locations — between a garage and the house, for example, where a fire door is a building regulations requirement. The main construction options are hollow-core (lightweight, cheap, poor sound performance), solid-core (heavier, better acoustic performance, more substantial feel when closing), and solid timber (the premium option, with real weight and longevity).

Style choices span from the classic four- or six-panel traditional door to the clean flush door popular in contemporary interiors, through to barn-door style sliding designs for where swing clearance is a constraint. Glazed internal doors borrow light between rooms — excellent for darker hallways and connecting rooms where natural light is limited. Primed doors are supplied ready for painting; pre-finished doors save time if you're happy with the supplied colour and don't anticipate wanting to repaint.

External Doors

External doors have considerably more to do — thermal efficiency, security, weather resistance, and durability while still looking good. The three main materials are timber, UPVC, and composite. Timber front doors have a classic warmth that UPVC doesn't replicate, and solid hardwood is genuinely durable if properly maintained — painted or stained every few years, with a covered porch to keep the worst weather off.

UPVC is the practical standard — thermally efficient, low-maintenance, secure with multi-point locking, available in a range of styles. Composite doors combine a timber or foam core with a GRP outer skin, delivering the look of a solid timber door with the low maintenance of UPVC and thermal performance that exceeds both. They've become the dominant choice for new external doors in UK residential use for good reason.

Bi-fold and Sliding Patio Doors

Bi-fold and sliding patio doors blur the boundary between inside and outside and have become one of the defining features of modern home extensions. Aluminium-framed systems offer the slimmest sightlines — more glass, less frame — and are the premium choice. UPVC bi-folds are more affordable but the frames are necessarily bulkier. The thermal performance of the glazing unit matters at least as much as the frame material, and triple glazing is worth considering for north-facing openings where solar gain isn't available to offset heat loss.

Hardware and Security

A door is only as good as its hardware. Multi-point locking on external doors is the security standard — engaging at three or more points along the door edge rather than just the central latch. Anti-snap cylinders (TS007 rated) resist the most common form of lock attack used in domestic burglaries. Door chains and security viewers add a further layer for front doors. The locks section covers security hardware in detail.

New external doors affect the thermal performance and overall efficiency of your home in ways that connect directly to heating costs. For the finishing touches — handles, hinges, letter plates — the fittings section covers the full hardware range. Our brands directory lists door suppliers across all types and price points, from internal door ranges through to premium composite and aluminium external systems. The deals section occasionally features significant reductions on door ranges — worth checking before committing, as the savings on a full-house internal door order can be meaningful.

One consideration worth flagging before purchase: door sizing. Standard UK internal doors are 1981mm tall and either 610mm, 686mm, or 762mm wide — but older properties frequently have non-standard openings that won't take a standard door without adjustment. Measure the existing door (not the opening) before ordering. External doors have even more variation, and bespoke sizing can add significantly to cost and lead time. Getting measurements right first saves a great deal of frustration later. On both internal and external doors, acoustic performance is also worth considering as part of the spec — a solid-core door between a home office and a noisy living space, or a bedroom fronting a busy road, makes a material difference to how that room functions day to day, and it costs nothing extra to specify at the point of purchase rather than trying to address it afterwards.