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Non Toxic Furniture
By Dr. Meg Christensen | Updated October 2025
Non toxic furniture brands, with every material they use analyzed for your health. Visually compare brands side by side, or shop by room instead.
Avocado offers bed frames, coffee tables, kids dressers, nightstands, armchairs, benches, dining tables, and stools. They use solid wood, non-toxic ECOS stains, and Titebond glues with GreenGuard Gold certification. For their upholstered furniture, they use GOLS certified latex and GOTS certified fabrics. The best part about Avocado is how transparent they are about every single material they use; the ingredients are always listed on the product page.
The brand Wood Furniture features the Ethnicraft collection, many pieces of which are made from 100% solid woods, joinery, and hardwax oil finishes, the healthiest you can get. They have over 300 options, so be sure to ask what glues or finishes are used if hardwax and joinery aren’t specified on the piece you’re interested in. You can use my material guides to decide if it’s healthy enough for you. The rating below represents their healthiest option.
Higher end 100% solid wood furniture including desks, bed frames, and media consoles made with traditional wooodworking. They use an all-organic flax-based wood finish that they make in house. If glue is needed, they use a very small amount of Titebond 3, a great non-toxic furniture glue option. They do have some furniture made by other brands that I can’t vouch for the materials in, but they’re clear about which ones they are, and the TY-made ones are fantastic from a health perspective.
Savvy Rest makes non toxic solid wood furniture including coffee tables, bed frames, benches and couches. You can choose a linseed oil (AKA flax) finish, or leave it unfinished. They use traditional mortise-and-tenon joinery, greatly minimizing the need for adhesives. Their certifications are displayed very easily in the footer of their website, which is so important for transparency reasons, and uncommon.
Medley offers modern, handmade, non toxic furniture including desks, storage consoles, armchairs, bed frames, coffee tables, dining tables, couches, and more. They’re almost always made of 100% solid wood, with formaldehyde-free engineered wood used sparingly to add strength on certain pieces. They’re very transparent about this on their materials page. All are finished with a plant-based, zero-VOC hardwax oil that is naturally water and heat-resistant. Zero-VOC glues are used only when necessary.
Built for Keeps makes a limited collection of modern solid wood furniture including coffee tables, bed frames, and night stands. Each piece is finished with plant-based oil stain, and water-based adhesives. They are also very transparent about brand names— they use Rubio Monocoat finish, and Titebond II glue, which is uncommon in the solid wood furniture world. This level of transparency is important for protecting you and for raising the bar for other companies.
The Natural Furniture store carries many different 100% solid wood furniture pieces from various US manufacturers, often at more affordable prices— including accent tables, coffee tables, side tables, and other solid wood living room furniture. Though materials vary by piece, they do not use formaldehyde-containing particleboard or MDF at all. You can select unfinished options, or choose one of their zero VOC plant-based finishes. Glue brand is unspecified but they stated in an email that it is low-VOC and that all their furniture meets California’s strict Prop 65 emission limits.
Naturepedic offers bedroom furniture, including dressers, bed frames, and night stands. All are made with 100% solid wood, are coated with water-based, low-VOC finishes, and held together with low-VOC adhesives. While they don’t disclose the brands of the finishes and glues they use, they do have GreenGuard GOLD certification meaning they’re tested for off-gassing, and they are UL validated formaldehyde-free.
Romina makes 100% solid wood furniture by hand in Europe, and they ship to the US. Their focus is on kids furniture, though they have adult options like dressers and bed frames, as well. They have many low-VOC choices for paints, stains, and finishes that you select when you order. Depending on the furniture and finish you select, it will either be water-based or oil-based. While I am waiting for information on the exact brands of finishes and glues they use, everything they sell is GreenGuard GOLD certified, meaning they will off-gas extremely minimally.
Green Cradle makes solid wood bookcases, night stands, dressers, and cribs by hand in California. Like Romina, they’re focused on kids furniture, but have adult options as well. They use 100% solid wood, and you can choose your type (walnut, maple, oak, cherry.) All are finished with flaxseed oil —as healthy as you can get. They use a small amount of non-toxic water based wood glue when they need to. You can choose unfinished versions if you’d prefer raw wood or to finish it on your own.
DIY Non Toxic Furniture
When I was a student on a budget, I made some of my own affordable non toxic furniture to save money, including my coffee table that I still use, above. I used turned wooden legs from Etsy, a solid piece of wood from the local live edge store, and super-healthy Rubio Monocoat to stain and finish it. Rubio Monocoat’s Oil Plus 2C is a 0% VOC stain and wood finish all in one, and if you don’t use the accelerator, which speeds drying time, it’s completely healthy. I have used the accelerator, and it smells vaguely like Elderberry syrup to me. Ha! The legs screw right in, and I didn’t do any fancy framing, so there’s no wood glue involved, though the Titebond brand is well-known as a high quality non-toxic choice.
Vermont Woods Studios houses and sells several brands of solid wood, handmade furniture. All are healthier than average, but Vermont Furniture Designs (VFD) is the healthiest, as explained in the materials section in their bio, here. They use solid wood (cherry, walnut, or maple) and finish with linseed oil or tung oil and wax. Even if you go with another brand, they all generally use low-VOC materials and have a high amount of transparency and information on each page— they are also very responsive to emails.
Shop Non Toxic Furniture by Category
Healthier Cribs
Dining Tables
Non Toxic Bed Frames
More About Non-Toxic Furniture
Learn more about what makes furniture toxic or healthy. Jump to: Non-Toxic Furniture Material Guides | Formaldehyde in Furniture
Non Toxic Furniture Materials
What makes furniture non-toxic?
To be considered non-toxic, every material used in a piece of furniture, including how it was processed and how it is finished, should be harmless to your health. This includes:
Frame: whether the furniture is made with a metal or wood frame, a healthier version is left unfinished, or is finished in non-toxic stain or paint. Though there are very few third party certifications for stains, finishes, and paints, GreenGuard GOLD can confirm low off-gassing, and GreenSeal will confirm that other harmful chemicals (that may not necessarily off-gas) are not present.
Furniture glues: healthy furniture should be held together with non-toxic adhesives, screws, or joinery. Though there are very few third party certifications for glues, GreenGuard GOLD can confirm low off-gassing.
Upholstery: if upholstered, both the filling and fabric should be processed and treated without harmful chemicals. OEKO TEX certified polyester and GOLS certified latex mean that the filling does not contain flame retardants, and both are better options than polyurethane foam. Fabric should be OEKO TEX certified or GOTS certified organic, which means it does not have toxic dyes, or PFAS-containing waterproofing or stain repellant treatments applied.
This can be a lot to keep track of, so I have a Material Guide for each component of furniture. At the bottom of each guide, is a useful and visual rating scale that can help you visually understand the nuances. I use these to stay unbiased and consistent when I’m analyzing products for the shop. I hope they’re useful for you, too.
Wood, Stains, Finishes
Upholstery Foam
Upholstery Fabric
Formaldehyde in Furniture
What is formaldehdye?
Formaldehyde is a gas, or a Volatile Organic Compound (VOC.) It is made in a chemical factory or laboratory by oxidizing methanol. In 2006, 12 million tons were produced, and in 2024, an estimated 51 million tons were made. It is used to make plastics, glues, wood finishes, wrinkle-resistant fabric finishes, melamine, plywood, MDF, particleboard, carpeting, foam insulation, and paint, and is the precursor to diisocyanates, which make polyurethane foam. It’s also used in non-home goods, like fertilizers, pesticides, nail polish, hair straightening products, and for purposes like embalming or preserving cosmetics. In short, it is a very popular chemical with many uses.
Why is formaldehyde used in furniture?
Formaldehyde is added to furniture for 4 reasons:
Stains, paints, lacquers, finishes, and other coatings: formaldehyde is added to these products as a preservative or biocide, to prevent the growth of fungi and bacteria during storage in their liquid form. It is also added because formaldehyde binds pigments together, and helps them form a nice-looking finish when they’re applied to the surface of the furniture.
Glues and adhesives: formaldehyde makes furniture glue very strong, fast-drying, and resistant to heat and water. It’s also inexpensive.
Particleboard, plywood, MDF, and other faux woods: these types of engineered “woods” are made by mixing wood powder with formaldehyde-containing glues. This makes the fake wood strong and water resistant, and is an inexpensive alternative to solid wood.
Foam: formaldehyde is the precursor to diisocyanates, which make polyurethane foam.
Why is formaldehyde dangerous?
Formaldehyde is known to be a human carcinogen, as established by the US National Toxicology Program in 2011, and supported by the EPA, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) and the American Cancer Society (ACS). It is associated with leukemia and nasal cancer.
Because it is used in so many places and because it is so volatile — meaning it evaporates from products into the air very easily— it is considered a major danger to health. It can also cause irritation of the skin, eyes, nose and throat. In some sensitive people, formaldehyde in moisturizers and makeup can cause an allergic skin reaction called allergic contact dermatitis.
How are you exposed to formaldehyde?
The main way you are exposed to formaldehyde is by breathing it in from products that off-gas it into the air.
How long does new furniture off gas?
Most formaldehyde is released from products over two years, but depending on the product and the conditions of your home, it can take as little as several weeks to as much as several years for formaldehyde to completely finish off-gassing. The speed will depend on how much formaldehyde is present in the product, and on temperature, humidity, and ventilation of the home it is in. Formaldehyde will off-gas faster at high temperatures and high humidity, and it will stay in the air longer if ventilation is poor. Formaldehyde off-gasses most intensely in the first few weeks, and slows down over time.
How much formaldehyde is in the air in the average home?
In older homes without new furniture or paint, or other formaldehyde sources, formaldehyde levels naturally hover below 0.1 parts per million. It is normal to have a small amount of formaldehyde exposure daily, and it is impossible to completely remove formaldehyde from the environment, but too much leads to health problems.
How to remove formaldehyde from furniture:
Formaldehyde will naturally be removed from furniture over time through off-gassing, but you can speed this up, or limit how much you’re exposed to, in 4 ways:
Ventilate daily by opening your windows.
Use an air purifier that is specifically able to capture gasses like formaldehyde. Most air purifiers cannot remove formaldehyde from the air, because it’s too small to be caught by a HEPA filter— you can see why visually in this guide. However, some air purifiers do contain formaldehyde-capturing minerals like activated charcoal or potassium, and these can help reduce indoor levels. These are the ones I recommend.
Let new products off-gas outside of the home, like in the garage, shed, or backyard, before bringing them in for use.
Use the bake out method very, very carefully (read more below)
Should I use the bake out method to speed up off-gassing from furniture?
The bake out method consists of closing all of your windows and turning up the heat to encourage formaldehyde and other gasses to come out of furniture. Afterward, the heat is turned off, and all the windows are opened to throughly ventilate the formaldehyde (and other VOC) -rich air into the outdoors. The origin of this idea is solid: using infrared technology in a lab setting effectively “bakes out” VOCs from high VOC building materials, and the technique is sometimes done after a new building is finished, before residents move in. These processes are highly controlled and measured, and involve a limited number of building materials, rather than an entire set of products and chemicals that are generally kept in a home. Because of that, the CDC does not recommend using this method on your own. This is valid for 3 reasons:
A DIY home bake-out can raise indoor VOC levels, and the ventilation process afterward may be inadequate to fully remove them. If you do this, be sure you are using ample exhaust fans and thoroughly circulating all air out of the home. Do not rely on windows alone, as simply opening them won’t necessarily be enough to move air out. An indoor air quality monitor can be helpful in monitoring to make sure you do it correctly, if you decide to do a bake out. Although no home monitors are advanced enough to detect formaldehyde as a distinct chemical separate from other VOCs (ignore any brands that say they can— it’s not true!), you will still be able to see an overall VOC reading, and you should wait to go inside until the numbers to go down to ambient levels (usually around 400 ppb).
Heating up a room releases not just formaldehyde from a limited number of building materials or particular products— but all VOCs from all products in the home, and these can potentially combine into new, more harmful compounds. VOCs are very reactive with each other and other components of the air, like particulate matter.
Increasing the concentration of VOCs in the air can mean that other products absorb them before the windows are opened, and retain them. Different materials hold on to different VOCs for different lengths of time, so this can introduce new problems.
Overall, there are no studies done to confirm that an at home DIY bake out is effective or safe. If you do so anyway, caution is advised!
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