Both a wetroom and a walk-in shower give you a spacious, step-free feel, but they are built very differently and suit different homes. Having fitted both across Glasgow, from Southside tenements to newer builds in Newton Mearns, we can tell you the better choice usually comes down to your floor, your budget and how the room will be used.
A walk-in shower is a low-profile shower tray, usually 25mm to 45mm high, with a fixed glass screen and no door. The tray collects the water and sends it to a waste in the normal way. The rest of the bathroom floor stays dry and is finished as usual.
A wetroom does away with the tray altogether. The whole floor is tanked with a waterproof membrane, a gradient is built into the floor so water runs to a drain, and the tiles go straight over the top. There may still be a glass screen, but the shower area and the bathroom floor are one continuous surface.
A walk-in shower is the cheaper and quicker option. Supplying and fitting a good quality tray, screen and shower valve, with tiling around the wet area, typically sits somewhere between £1,500 and £3,500 depending on tile choice and whether pipework needs moving. It can usually be done in two to four days as part of a wider bathroom refit.
A wetroom costs more because of the extra labour and materials involved. Tanking the floor, forming the gradient, fitting a proper drain and tiling a sloped floor with smaller tiles takes longer and needs more care. Realistically you are looking at £3,000 to £6,000 or more for the shower area alone, and the whole floor has to come up, so expect the room to be out of action for a week or longer. These are rough ranges and the final figure depends on the size of the room and the condition of what is underneath.
Most Glasgow tenements and older semis have suspended timber floors. These move slightly with the seasons and with foot traffic, and that movement is the enemy of a wetroom. It can be done, but it needs a rigid wetroom former, marine ply or a tile backer board, and a flexible tanking system, all of which adds cost. Even then, a walk-in tray is often the safer bet in an upstairs flat where a leak would affect the neighbour below.
On a solid concrete floor, common in bungalows and post-war council-built houses across the city, a wetroom is far more straightforward. The screed can be cut and laid to a fall, and the drain positioned where you need it. If you have a ground-floor concrete slab and the budget for it, this is where a wetroom really comes into its own.
Walk-in showers keep the water where you expect it. The tray edge is low enough to step over easily, the rest of the floor stays dry, and if anything ever goes wrong with the seal it is usually a straightforward fix. The downside is that a tray is still a step, and a wide tray in a small room can look bulky.
Wetrooms are the better choice for anyone who needs level access, including wheelchair users or people who find even a small lip a trip hazard. They also make a compact bathroom feel bigger. The trade-offs are that water can travel further than you think, so towels and loo roll need to be placed carefully, the floor needs anti-slip tiles, and a poorly built gradient will leave puddles that never drain. In our experience, the quality of the installer matters more with a wetroom than with almost any other bathroom job.
For most Glasgow homes, especially tenement flats and houses with timber floors, a walk-in shower with a low tray gives you nearly all the benefits of a wetroom at a lower cost and with less risk. A wetroom is the better product when accessibility is the priority or when the floor construction makes it simple to do properly. Neither is universally better. The right answer is the one that suits your floor, your household and how long you plan to stay in the house.
Yes, but it needs a rigid former, a tile backer board and a flexible tanking system to cope with floor movement, which pushes the cost up. Many people in upper flats choose a low-profile walk-in tray instead because a failed wetroom seal can damage the flat below.
A properly tanked wetroom should not leak at all, but there is less margin for error than with a tray. Problems almost always come from poor tanking, a badly formed gradient or the wrong drain, so the installer's experience is critical.
Both are popular with buyers and neither should put anyone off. A wetroom with level access can be a real selling point for older buyers or anyone planning to stay long term, while a walk-in shower is a safe, broadly appealing upgrade in almost any property.