The Best Area Rugs Under $500

Posted in Angelcityfurniture

Sometimes you need an area rug just to cover ugly floors, to keep downstairs neighbors from hearing you walk around, or to make your place feel homey without spending a lot of money. We spent more than 60 hours researching hundreds of budget area rugs, interviewing experts, and testing rugs with panelists, then put our feet on our favorites at home (and let a cat do his best to destroy them) for many more hours. Of the 42 rugs we tested, we highly recommend 13 that come in multiple sizes, colors, and patterns. We have picks for flat-woven , low-pile , and high-pile rugs that will suit a range of functional purposes and decorating styles.

We focused primarily on rugs available in an 8-by-10-foot size for around $500 or less (most of the rugs we tested come in many smaller sizes, too). After a year of testing, we found that, in this price range, flat-woven rugs held up better than the higher-pile kind, and that all-cotton rugs, or those with a cotton-wool or cotton-polyester blend, were more durable than all-polyester ones, so our recommendations tend toward those.

Even if you don’t fall in love with any of the specific rugs in this guide, we have plenty here to point you in the right direction. We share the advice of design pros regarding which types of rugs function best in high- and low-traffic areas, what rug size to buy, and how to choose a rug pattern or color that will shine in your living space.