Choosing construction adhesives can be one of the more overwhelming parts of material selection for a build.
However, just like with caulking sealants, the same types of low-VOC polymers are also used in construction adhesives, window and door installs, flooring, and roofs.
And there are some really good options out there.
The article covers the best types and the best brands for those who are chemically sensitive or who want a very low-VOC non-toxic option.
PFAS, phthalates, and which antimicrobials are used are unfortunately often not disclosed.
This article contains affiliate links, upon purchase I earn a commission at no extra cost to you.
1. Construction Adhesives
Construction adhesives are used for subfloors, to install doors (glue down threshold), to build stairs, exterior brickwork, install some shower walls, under countertops, and more.
i. AFM Almighty Adhesive
AFM Almighty Adhesive is the best adhesive I have ever tested.
I had absolutely no problem and no reaction to smelling it while it was wet.
This was a pleasant surprise after all the other glues and silicones I had been testing.
It is a highly tolerable very low odor, multipurpose adhesive (make sure it’s right for your application). The PSI is 500 (in other words it’s a very strong adhesive).
It is a polyether (30-80%) and nepheline syenite (30-60%) adhesive, with 1-5% amino silane.
I used Almighty to install my shower, on subfloors, and my countertops (it can even be used on waterfall countertops). I would use this anywhere and everywhere this can be used since it’s the healthiest adhesive I have found.
Insider tip, this is the same formula as Build Secure by Chemlink.
Where to buy: Buy Almighty from Green Design Center.
ii. Chemlink WallSecure
Chemlink WallSecure is made for bonding drywall, gypsum, landscape blocks, capstones, stone, foam, fiberglass, FRP panels, and ceiling systems.
I haven’t tested this one but this brand makes great low-toxin adhesives.
Where to buy: Buy from Amazon.
iii. Chemlink M-1
Chemlink M-1 can perform as both an adhesive and a sealant.
It adheres to a wide range of construction materials including PVC, EPDM, most metals, wood, glass, masonry concrete, fiberglass, and solvent-sensitive foams so it works in almost any situation requiring a sealant.
With a 400 psi and 525% elongation, it also performs as a structural adhesive.
M-1 is a solvent-free silane-modified polyether.
Where to buy: Buy from Amazon.
IV. Ecotite ET 5500 and 9500
This is another good brand that is well-liked by the chemically sensitive.
Their ET 5500 is an adhesive that works on multiple surfaces: PVC, concrete, glass, aluminum, painted surfaces, wood plywood, marble, metal, and more.
At about one week most would find this odorless. At two weeks it seemed totally offgassed. I was very happy with this one.
The 9500 is used for windows, doors, trim, and some kitchen applications. At three weeks it’s still not odorless/offgassed. I’m not as happy with this one as it did not stop offgassing by three weeks.
The bottles say odorless, but the point in time that it is odorless depends on the conditions (curing rate) and how sensitive your sense of smell is.
Right off the bat, the 5500 is significantly milder, and lower odor than conventional adhesives.
Where to buy: The links to the 5500 and 9500 are to a Canadian store, but you can find this product in the US as well.
Non-Toxic Adhesives for Hardwood Floor Installation
The type of glue you will need for a flooring installation depends on the method:
with a Floating Floor, the planks are clicked together and installed over an underlayment but not glued or nailed down.
Tongue and groove glue is often used on the edges (Roberts is zero-VOC).
With Nail Down installation an underlayment is used and the floor is not glued down.
i. Glue Assist
This installation involves gluing down and nailing the floor. This is often used for wide planks and/or when there are big fluctuations in humidity. If you want to avoid glue, don’t go for wide planks. Glues can be silane-modified polyether or polyurethane. Silane-modified types are lower toxicity, but be sure to check the warranty for the floor to make sure that is approved.
ii. Glue Down
In this method, the glue is installed evenly on the floor. Many of the glues are polyurethane. Some are 0-VOC like Bostik Greenforce (which does say it’s a urethane adhesive). There are reports of this glue type not curing well under the floor, and offgassing for longer than expected.
Non-Toxic Adhesives for Window & Door Install
These can be found in the book and course.
Non-Toxic Adhesives for Roofing
These can be found in the book and course.
Corinne Segura is an InterNACHI-certified Healthy Homes Inspector with certifications in Building Biology, Healthier Materials and Sustainable Buildings, and more. She has 10 years of experience helping others create healthy homes. You can book a consult here.
Join the top Substack on healing from MCS and mold!
Lon
Can you recommend a non toxic painters tape to adhere painters plastic to walls? The blue one is SO stinky so I’m looking for an alternative that doesn’t smell.
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
green is better than blue but you might have to go with a different kind of tape i talk about these in other articles
Lon
Can you send me a link to the article where you reference this? I can’t seem to find it.
Erin
I did not realize until after we purchased our flooring that they require us to use a urethane adhesive for glue assist. On the positive side, it’s glue assist so we only have to do a thin zig zag pattern on the back of each plank so it’s better than fully covering everything. But if having to go the route of urethane, is there one that is less toxic and off gasses fastest?
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
The best you can do is low VOC from what I have seen. The ones I have seen were relatively slow to off-gas.
Martina Daly
A non toxic adhesive for oak parquet, I’m looking for. I don’t like chemicals. I know adhesives have to comply to high standards now. But I’m wondering even at that what does it mean by low voc’s or non toxic. Once adhesives cure is all off gassing of voc’s gone, finished. My home im was built by a sustainable housing group so this means it is very well insulated m(not necessarily eco friendly options, I think), it’s small, a wooden framed house (which has more to do with sound I think) and quite air tight so off gassing would concern me. Hope you can help. I think you are USA and I’m in Europe as I recognise the site now from looking at it when we arrived here first. But thank you anyway, you might have some relevant information .
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
the brands will be different but the different types of adhesives by chemical class will be the same
Kyle Barber
Thanks so much for the information. Currently building a certified passive house and limiting VOCs as much as possible. I’m installing two layers of subfloor and gluing them together (concreteless slab). My contractor is open to using AFM Almighty, but not excited that it only comes in 10oz tubes. I also hate the idea of that much plastic waste. I need to find something in 28oz tubes or 20oz sausages. A builder in Canada blogged about using Prosoco Airdam and I have seen other builders use Liquid Nails Subfloor and Deck which claims to be greenguard gold. Wondering if you had any experience with either of these, particularly liquid nails since it is so readily available.
Loralyn Sardella
I have to use an adhesive to anchor an Ikea kitchen island to the floor. They have recommended PL. We’re gluing raw wood to engineered hard wood. This is a last minute unexpected switch up thanks to Ikea’s ineptitude. I have a time constraint of less than 48 hours to acquire the adhesive, so likely am limited to Amazon overnight or local stores. What would be your top recommendation for this purpose? It needs to be a relatively strong adhesive, with low and fast off gassing. The tipping risk with this island is not severe because the cupboard section is heavy and then will be heavily weighted, but the overhang of 12.5″ makes a lever thus requiring the anchor system. Also do you have any feedback on tolerability in general of PL products? I believe adhesives reduce in smell significantly with dry and cure times, but can off gas longer, but I’m not sure how long?
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
can you link to which PL adhesive
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
ideally you would not use a polyurethane there but use a polyether with the needed PSI, not totally sure what’s in store there though
Loralyn Sardella
ChatGPT recommends approx 400PSI and SikaBond AT-Universal, Soudal Fix All or LePage 375G Hybrid which are polymers. SikaBond is meant to be “low odour”, but I have no idea at all how strongly it smells. Adding a link to one of them. Cure time of 24 hours seems much better than PL300 which is 7 days and I think is overkill. However, AI disagrees and suggests hardwood adhesives specifically. It’s pretty overwhelming with so much conflicting info. I was wondering which of your products in this article would have the strength for the job? https://gbr.sika.com/en/construction/roofing/flat-roof-productsandsystems/liquid-roofing/liquid-applied-roofingaccessories/elastic-sealing-andbonding/sikabond-at-universal.html
Loralyn Sardella
More research has shown that PL may be too rigid with exception of possibly this low VOC product: Thus far Sika, Mapei, or Bostik are choices from AI, so Sika is consistent with chatGPT also. It’s a pretty daunting category of products.
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
You’ll have to check the PSI of the ones to consider, look for polyether even if it has the same VOC levels as polyurethane. Cure time is not off-gas time. low VOC polyether under or around 10 g/l voc is what you want with the right PSI.
Jade
Hi Cornnie,
Thank you so much for your very informative articles and we’ve relied on them a lot for our renovation! We’ll go with solid hardwood flooring, quartz kitchen countertop and use Almighty adhesive as much as possible as per your advice. But for the quartz countertop, our contractor says they’ll have to use a stone to stone adhesive called Superior V-MAX (formulated Premium Vinyl Ester resin). For between the cabinets and quartz they can use Almighty but for stone to stone they prefer this one. I didn’t find any adhesive particular for the stones in your article. Is there one that you would recommend for that purpose? Thank you so much in advance!
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
yes that is right, i havent covered those epoxy stone to stone glues on the site
Jade
Do you have any epoxy stone to stone glue to recommend as our contractor insists using one for the quartz countertop project? Any product that is less toxic than others maybe?
faiz
This blog post by Corinne Segura is incredibly informative and valuable for anyone seeking low-VOC, non-toxic construction adhesives, especially those with chemical sensitivities. The detailed breakdown of each product, such as AFM Almighty Adhesive and Chemlink M-1, helps readers make informed decisions based on both performance and safety. It’s reassuring to see real-use insights on curing times and odor levels, especially for products like Ecotite ET 5500. The inclusion of flooring installation techniques and how adhesives vary between floating, nail-down, and glue-down methods is also practical. With environmental concerns and indoor air quality becoming priorities, the push toward safer, low-VOC options like these is essential. For a broader market perspective on the growing demand and innovation in this space, the market trends on the Low VOC Adhesive Market shared here are also worth exploring:
Great work bringing attention to health-conscious building products!
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
don’t use AI to write comments to promote your business. promotional links are removed
TPaxton
I want to use a low VOC adhesive to glue insulation panels to the roof of my chicken coop and I don’t know what’s safe because they have to be able to go back into the coop at night. I can’t leave them out anywhere else and I just want to know what would be safe to use and safe for them after 8 hours
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
I can’t say what will be Ok for animals without having a vet chime in. I’m also not sure which ones would be 0-VOC within a day if any.
Elizabeth
Hi Corinne,
Have you heard of Tec Wood Secure adhesive? If so, would you consider it non toxic? My contractor plans to use this for installing prefinished hardwood and claims it’s safe. I’ve read the sds but not sure what to think. I’ve a young child in the home. Thanks!
Marie
What is a safe tape used for sealing nail holes/staple holes when installing a plastic vapor barrier or housewrap? You mention using tape with Intello.
(I searched your website and your book, and did not see the answer.)
I appreciate your help. Thanks!!
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
It depends on the brand of vapor barrier, vapor retarder or housewrap. usually each brand has their own tape.
Anna Rose
This site is great, the advice is greatly appreciated. Apologies if this is a repetition of someone elses question but I can’t find the answer. Our joiner suggested to use Würth Rapid (structural adhesive) and EVO-stick wood glue for a wood project. I guess these must be common as per previous comment. Please can you advise if you are familiar with them and if they are ok or should he use something else instead? What would be the equivalent safest option, AFM Almighty for the adhesive to attach the wood to the wall & Titebond Hide or ECOS/Lakeland for the wood glue? Do these have PFAS? Someone else mentioned Auro? Thank you
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
I’m not familiar with european products, I can’t advise on those
Clara
Thank you for all the info.
A local carpenter is making a solid wood (tulipwood) built in wardrobe for our bedroom and I was wondering if you could recommend a glue or adhesive (I don’t know the difference) for the carpenter to use to glue the back of the wooden wardrobe to the wall (I guess it is made of bricks but it is painted) and also to glue all the wardrobe parts together.
Would you recommend the AFM Almighty or Chemlink adhesives in this post or the Titebond, ECOS, Elmer’s wood glues from your glue post? Ideally one that could avoid PFAS, phthalates, plastiziders and formaldehy if possible due to having small children. We are based in Northern Ireland but most of these are available here too.
I have seen other brands advertised as non toxic like Auro or Lakeland but it is more reassuring if we go for a brand that you can recommend 🙂
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
The carpenter should advise on what type of glue and adhesive they need for those two needs, it’s likely to need a construction adhesive and wood glue.
Clara
Our carpenter said that he uses two different types depending on the tasks, a Würth rapid structural adhesive and a EVO stick wood glue. Are these toxic? Would you recommend to replace these with the AFM Almighty or Chemlink adhesives & the Titebond, ECOS, Elmer’s wood glues?
I would appreciate your help as I am afraid to ask the carpenter too much in case he does not want to do the job and I feel very anxious about this. Thank you again
Inbar
Hi Corinne,
Thanks for all your articles.
I have to replace my countertop (at the sink area) and i’m looking into stainless steel. I spoke to one fabricator and he said that to install the stainless steel he uses contact cement.
He said it’s non toxic and non flammable, I don’t know if he uses Solvent based contact cement and meant that after it dries it’s non toxic or if he uses water based (though i doubt he’d use water based as i read it doesn’t work well with non porous materials).
My question is; is solvent contact cement really non toxic after it dries?
i’m chemically sensitive but I’m more concerned about long term health issues rather than getting triggered by the smell.
thanks in advance
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
I’d go with a thicker gauge, no underlayment, no glue, otherwise going to the extreme of metal countertops doesnt really make sense. see countertop post for more.
inbar Strauch
Thank you!
He said he uses water based contact cement, and he said it’s non toxic and non flammable, do you agree with this?
Thanks Inbar
Karyn
Hello Corrine. Do you know of any commercially available isothiazolinone free vinyl flooring adhesives available in Canada? We had a flood in our apartment building so we have to go with the replacement flooring the building uses and because I have such a severe allergy to isothiazolinones I want to supply the adhesive used. Thanks in advance
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
I don’t
Matt Kale
Hello, I appreciate all of your content and have chosen to go with engineered hardwood floors over concrete. Reading some comments below and the article I am having a hard time choosing the rights adhesive. I am not chemically sensitive but want to choose the product that will likely do the least harm. Is choosing something like Bostik the best course of action? In a perfect world I would be nailing it down but that is not an option. Thanks for your advice.
Tanman
Hi Corrine,
Have you looked into Vapor Barrier or crawl space encapsulation adhesives/sealants? To mitigate radon, proposed solution is a crawl space encapsulation made of plastic sheets (with fan), but vendor says they need a lot of glue to seal it. Per the vendor, the glue emits a lot of VOC and odor in the first 2-4 days. The glue he uses is NuFlex 446 Acoustical Vapour Barrier Adhesive, and it is very specific to Vapor Barriers that are made of plastic sheets. Vendor says needs the right glue because a weak adhesive would create leaks in the encapsulation. If the glue doesn’t offgas or cause health issues to the family after this 2-4 days then i’m more fine with it, but don’t know how to tell if it would continue to offgas harmful substances for a long time even if we can’t smell it. I appreciate all your work/research and would love to hear if you have any suggestions/recommendations on this. Thank you!
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
I don’t remember that off the top of my head, but yeah have looked at it before
AS
Hi Corrine,
Would the AFM Mighty adhesive work for glueing the first plank of solid hardwood and then using the nail down method for the rest. Our contractor said he prefers to glue down the first plank and uses Bona sausage glue, although they are green guard gold and zero voc, the ingredients list plasticizers and I’m worried about those.
Thank you in advance.
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
yes it would likely work, ask your contrator. They both likely have the same plasticizers though. That doesnt matter under a wood floor as it will be blocked.
AS
Thank you so much Corinne! That’s very helpful.
Caro
Any experience with safebond hybrid adhesive?
Do you have any specific recommendations for countertops made of natural stone such as quartzite?
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
I don’t have experience with safebond. I have an article called non-toxic countertops
Amy de Wall
Hi Corrine,
Firstly, thank you SO much for kindly sharing all your knowledge. I’ve been going through all your articles for our new build coming up. I’m feeling overhwhelmed as I’m in Australia and so most products mentioned aren’t available here.
We are not chemically sensitive, however we are health fanatics. We are building a certified PassivHaus because of this. My question is, is VOC offgassing less of an overall concern in a passivehaus than non passive haus, given the HRV filter system?
Thank you SO much,
Amy
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
air exchange definitely helps especially in a very tight build. i would still go low VOC and avoid all the products in the article on most toxic materials to avoid in a build
Gina
The previous comment about the silane based adhesive still off-gassing after weeks is very concerning. I’m about to have engineered wood floors extended and it’s going to require glue. We were going to use Bona because I thought silane would be the better option. Is it better to go with a low odor/low voc urethane adhesive?
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
I don’t know, I’ve always advised chemically sensitive clients to not do a glue down installation so I don’t have a lot of feedback on that. Urethanes have always traditionally offgassed slower but I don’t know if in this case they can offgas better through layers of flooring.
Michael
All of the Zero VOC wood flooring adhesives I’ve tested (Bona, Bostik, Fortane) give off significant (7,000-38,000 ppb) VOCs when you open the pail and apply them to the floor.
I have been told that their VOC emissions should approach zero after they are fully cured. However, on two separate occasions in Florida, I have seen significant VOC emissions from these products extend beyond 3-4 weeks. It seems completely irresponsible to label these as “Zero VOC”. It should be illegal.
You can find a little more about some of the issues that I’m facing in this question:
https://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/question/silane-based-zero-voc-wood-flooring-adhesives-and-off-gassing
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
there is a lot going on in that link, first cali cork flooring is almost certainly not 0 VOC even if the company says it’s really low. Maybe they tested a sample and not the new flooring shipment. Most flooring has offgassing even if it’s natural VOCs, and those are often not counted by the companies and the biggest likely offgasser.
Also those monitors are not very accurate so that’s another big problem in that testing.
If it’s a sil terminated polyether that is usually fairly fast to offgas in a week or so. If it’s a polyurethane that could be slower even if the initial VOCs are lower when wet.
I don’t know what’s going on with these specific products, it’s possible that they are not VOC until two weeks as they could still list the product as 0 VOC. There have been various FTC violations about VOC claims so it’s possible something is up. What are you using to test those products at 3-4 weeks and is there nothing else new like new flooring?
if you are chemically sensitive you should definitely trust your own senses if you can still notice it at 3-4 weeks, I always try to avoid glue down plank flooring for those who are extremely sensitive.
Corinne Segura, Building Biologist
I also see the response in GBA that if it’s really thick it sometimes doesnt cure through the floor. That is very interesting and good to know.
Jeremy Bazata
Hi Corrine,
Replacing tub. Floor is our about 1/2 inch and needs to be leveled – what material is safe to use for floor leveling? Then need to seat the tub – I couldn’t find in anything on this in your bathtub and shower article. Any help you could provide would be fantastic!
Thank you so much,
Jeremy
Corinne Segura
There’s an article on self leveling cement, and one for caulking, for around the toilet. As for the toilet wax ring I think any of them should be fine.