We have beautiful dark hardwoods that show EVERYTHING. If I could go back, I would still get them (I know, I know, but I LOVE them) but I would get them in a matte finish. It's really the glossiness that shows dirt and scratches, not so much the color.

We have dark hardwood flooring all throughout our home and as much as i love it...and i do absolutely love it, it shows EVERYTHING! We have 3 kids under 6 and 2 pugs and i am constantly sweeping, steam mopping and picking up...but i do love it...

no kids yet, but we have a dog and cat who have definitely given the dark wood floors some "character". i really don't mind it, though, the floors still look nice unless you get on your hands and knees to inspect the damage. if you love dark hardwoods i would say go for it!

It might depend on how glossy they are and how dark the wood is, or if it was stained.

My parents had very dark wood on the first flour of their house. It survived three kids and many dogs, cats, and even one house chicken without showing any scratches, but it was "rustic" style so any small problems probably wouldn't show up anyway.

In preparation for our baby, we just tore out our carpet and replaced it with glossy, dark (espresso) laminate. It's beauuutiful; I love the look and the fact that it will stand up to not only the kiddo, but also our 2 crazy dogs.

But yes, it does show smudges quite readily, and I think both the dark color and the high shine contribute to that issue. With a high-quality laminate, you don't really get scratches the way you do with hardwood, so at least that isn't a problem. You can always clean the floor and it looks perfect... but then it looks dirty again fairly quickly just because everything shows up.

I bought my house with light hardwood floors. In three years my 4 year old and three cats have managed to destroy them! I have another little girl on the way and I'm dreaming of the day when the kids get older and I can have them redone...DARK. So basically I think you should get what you like because they will have to be redone someday anyway.

We have light and dark and the dark shows way more dirt/dust/glitter/smudges etc...

this is a great consensus and very helpful. i'm going for it, and love the idea of the matte finish which i would not have considered prior to reading these comments. thanks so much for this very helpful feedback, Ohdeedohers!

We have dark matte laminate (Brazilian cherry). It does show everything, but I love it. You just have to mop and sweep regularly.

I have dark hardwood floors in a matte finish and I love them. They do show dust and dirt easily, but with 2 babies crawling all over the floors I like being able to tell when the floor is dirty so I can clean it up!

just curious, does anyone know the secret to keeping hardwood floors clean and glossy?

twin toddlers and a large golden retriever keep ours looking smudgy and dull no matter what i try.

We covered our hardwood flooring with FLOR modular because the floor was not conducive to tumbling or the kind of floor play young children need, not because we thought it was dusty too fast.

We have 3 kids and 1 large dog and have dark hardwood floors in our house (partly on the advice of the 'designer' at the flooring store who told us they hold up well and don't show scratches). They are beautiful and hide the scratches well but they show every speck of dust and furballs. Constantly sweeping. My mom has light floors and many many dust bunnies which you never notice!

We have two kids and a dog and put in dark hardwood floors with a matte finish in early January. I wish we had done it years ago. I dust mop every couple of days, and it looks fine in between.

We just pulled up our carpets to reveal BEAUTIFUL oak floors. My next door neighbor who has 3 children (now adults) and several dogs at any given time (currently 4) offered two pieces of advice to me:

1) REJUVINATE - her cleaning people use it every week! GORGEOUS! I've used it on mine and it does refresh the color and shine PLUS it "touches" up scratches a bit - making them less visible.

2) ROOMBA - she runs it once a day to pick up dust bunnies. Still have to buy a Roomba. In the meantime, I've been vacuuming and sweeping quite a bit as well! Still have dust settling from the sanding and refinishing.

Good luck!

Oh! Forgot. You can get REJUVINATE from OSH or Home Depot.

We replaced the floors of a previous home with espresso wood floors. While every spec of dust showed with young kids we selected a handscraped/distressed wood which was stunning and didn't show scratches. Oh I miss those gorgeous floors. In our current home we have honey colored wood floors which aren't quite so spectacular but they hardly show a thing. Good luck.

We have dark floors and they do show everything, but I wouldn't trade them for anything...except maybe painted white, but I think that would show more. I have a swiffer type thing I got from stanley steemer and my 5 year old and I take turns dusting the floors. It's not a big deal to me, but I've always loved dark floors.