Having a pool table at home is a dream for a lot of players, and for plenty of them the only room with the space for one is upstairs. That makes the floor the first thing to worry about.
Obviously, pool tables are heavy. But assuming your home was built to code and that the weight of the pool table doesn’t exceed the weight limit of your second floor, you can safely place a pool table upstairs. So unless you live in a really old home, the only problem you’ll have with putting a pool table on the second floor is getting it there.How Much Weight Will the Second Floor of Your House Hold?
A second floor built to modern code supports 30 to 40 pounds per square foot of live load, depending on what the room is used for.
Those numbers come from Table R301.5 of the International Residential Code, which most US jurisdictions adopt with local amendments. The IRC sets 40 pounds per square foot for rooms other than bedrooms and 30 for sleeping rooms. Since pool tables for home use run from roughly 100 pounds up to 1,000, there’s little reason to worry about whether your second floor can take one.
Doing the Math on Your Floor
Multiply the square footage of the room by the per-square-foot limit and you have your ceiling. A 10×10 room rated at 40 pounds per square foot holds 4,000 pounds. The same room rated at 30 holds 3,000.
A 1,000-pound slate table spread across 35 or more square feet sits well within either figure. As long as the table and everything else in the room stay under that ceiling, you’re fine. Code minimums are deliberately conservative, so don’t blow past them by much without asking a structural engineer first.
What Is the Maximum All-In Weight?
Your all-in weight is the table plus everything else already standing on that floor. Even if the table fits inside the load limit on its own, every couch and TV stand and beer fridge in the room draws on the same budget, and so do the people playing. Run the numbers on the whole room.
The total climbs faster than people expect. Put a 700-pound slate table in a room that already holds a 100-pound couch and a 150-pound beer fridge, then add four adults at roughly 175 pounds each, and you’re at about 1,650 pounds. A 10×10 room rated at 40 pounds per square foot covers that with room to spare, and the figure is still more than double what the table’s spec sheet alone would tell you.
Slate vs. MDF: How Heavy Is Your Table?
Slate tables generally weigh 650 to 1,000 pounds, while MDF tables come in much lighter at 100 to 300 pounds. Those two bed materials account for nearly every table sold.
Because a slate bed is so much heavier, the frame and legs underneath have to be built stronger to carry it. MDF is a wood-based product and weighs far less to begin with. Either way, both styles land well under the load limit of most second-story floors. If you’re still choosing between them, our best pool table brands guide ranks manufacturers on build quality and on warranty terms you can actually collect on.
A 7-foot table is the easiest size to put upstairs, since it carries less slate and takes up less floor than an 8-footer. Our best 7-foot pool tables roundup lists the assembled weight of every pick, which is the number you actually want before you commit to a room on the second story.
Was My House Built to Code?
Anything built in recent decades almost certainly was, since the IRC load minimums have been standard for a long time. Older houses are where it gets uncertain, because some predate current standards and may not carry as much added weight as a newer build.
To pin down the actual capacity of your second floor, you’ll usually need the original blueprints, or you can look up the code your local building department enforces. Either one gives you the per-square-foot number to run through the calculation above.
A Few Other Things to Check
Two things are left to check: the route up and the stairs themselves. Once the table is in place the floor handles it fine, and the real difficulty of this project is getting it up there at all. Measure your doorways and the turns on the way up before you commit to hauling a fully assembled slate table to the second story.
If the stairs are the part that won’t work, a folding table sidesteps the problem entirely. The lightest 6-foot model in our best folding pool table picks weighs 65 pounds, which is inside the range that one person and a helper can carry up a staircase in a single trip.
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