Yellow Pine vs White Pine: What's The Difference?
When choosing between yellow pine and white pine for your next project, understanding the key differences in appearance, durability, availability, and cost can help you make the best decision for your specific needs.
Yellow pine is harder and more durable than white pine, with distinctive grain patterns and rich colors that make it ideal for traditional or rustic interiors. White pine is softer, more flexible, and easier to work with, often preferred for its lighter, cleaner appearance in modern designs.
White pine grows faster and is more readily available, making it less expensive. Yellow pine, especially old-growth heartwood, is harder to source and more costly due to its slower growth and limited availability.
In this blog, we take a closer look at how these classic American softwoods were used historically, and how the different properties of each continue to shape how both new growth and reclaimed woods are used today.
North and South: Yellow Pine vs. White Pine
While yellow and white pine may look similar at first glance, these woods are derived from very different tree species native to different regions of the United States. That affects both the quality and durability of wood, as well as their availability in your area.
Yellow Pine
Yellow pine usually refers to wood from mature longleaf pines. Trees up to 400 years old once grew in vast forests across the southeastern United States and were widely used to build the factories, mills, and warehouses of the early American industrial revolutions.
Today, these original growth hardwoods are greatly valued for the hardness and beauty of their distinctive heartwood and are reclaimed from disused historical buildings.
This limited supply is supplemented by new-growth yellow pine from commercial forests across much of the range of the original longleaf forests. While this younger wood lacks the distinctive aged heartwood of old-growth yellow pine, it remains a tough, durable, and highly sought-after material.
White Pine
Eastern white pine was a common native tree species across the northeastern United States. It was widely used for construction and flooring in New England and elsewhere. Although softer than deciduous hardwoods like maple or ash, it was also easier to work and acquired a distinctive patina with time and use.
Today, white pine remains popular for flooring and construction and the traditional wainscotting and paneling associated with New England decorative styles.
High-quality white pine woods are reclaimed from buildings throughout the northeast and sourced from modern commercial forests throughout the region. White pine matures far faster than longleaf yellow pine, making it a cheaper and more readily available choice.
Tall Order: White Pine vs. Yellow Pine
Yellow and white pine both offer popular and beautiful alternatives for almost any construction or decorative application, making it sometimes difficult to choose between the two. Each, however, has specific characteristics that make it better suited for particular uses.
Appearance
Yellow pine can be identified by its long distinctive “cathedral”-like grain loops, particularly in original heartwood sources from the center of original old-growth trees. Yellow pine also varies from light yellow sapwood to a deep reddish brown in the heartwood and around knots.
Untreated white pine is much lighter than yellow pine with far less well-developed grains and fewer, more elongated knots. In fact, commercially grown white pine may sometimes look closer to birch wood used often in Scandinavian design. In fact, the subtle grain and “clean” look of white pine make it a popular choice for more modern interiors. The less distinctive and directional grain also means it’s an easier choice to match in flooring and furniture design.
The distinctive grain arches of yellow pine are prized for flooring, furniture, and paneling in more traditional and homely interiors. Reclaimed woods of both types may have darker oxidation around nail holes and marks from insect boring or woodworking.
Durability
Yellow pine grows more slowly and consistently in the longer days and milder climate of the southeast, resulting in a significantly harder and less flexible wood than white pine. Commercial yellow pine typically measures around 870 on the Janka wood hardness scale, although old-growth heartwood can be far harder.
This hardness gives yellow pine a toughness and durability unusual in a coniferous softwood, making it a mainstay of construction during America’s early industrial expansion.
By contrast, white pine is a significantly softer and more flexible wood, growing rapidly in short bursts during northern summers. This makes white pine easier to harvest and work but less durable than yellow pine. It also means white pine is more stable than yellow pine and less prone to warping or splitting over time, so it’s a good material for floorboards.
Both types of wood need to be protected with stains or sealants when used for flooring. White pine is also more prone to wear in high-traffic areas, although its flexibility means it can sometimes “absorb” damage from dropped objects or stiletto heels. With reasonable care and occasional refinishing, both reclaimed and new-growth pine floors of both species can last for decades if not centuries.
Sourcing and Availability
Both white and yellow pine are grown commercially, so it is usually easy to find reasonable quality wood in almost any length and grade. White pine grows significantly faster than yellow pine, so both new and reclaimed stocks are available, especially throughout the northeast.
Longleaf yellow pine grows more slowly, so there is less of it harvested each year. Therefore, suppliers are more heavily dependent on the limited supply of reclaimed wood. Stocks of both commercial and reclaimed yellow pine are usually easier to find in the southeast, but supplies of longer and wider grades can be hard to source.
You’ll also want to look at reclaimed wood from a trusted supplier like E.T. Moore if you are looking for the distinctive pinkish tones and grain of true old-growth yellow pine heartwood.
Wherever you choose to source your wood from, be aware that quality can vary widely. Be sure to choose a reputable supplier with access to higher quality, better seasoned, and properly graded stocks.
Cost
Faster-growing commercial white pine will usually be far cheaper than comparable grades of yellow pine, but the quality and price of both stocks vary drastically.
You’ll pay more for genuine old-growth yellow pine heartwoods, and more for reclaimed yellow pine in general, so if you are serious about sourcing these woods it’s essential to work with a supplier who will provide you with responsibly sourced and reliably graded products.
Reclaimed white pine is more plentiful, but higher quality and wider grades will cost more, especially for authentic old-growth stock.
As with anything, you’ll get what you pay for, so weigh your investment carefully. Tight-grained old-growth woods offer stability and durability unrivaled by many modern building materials and will last for centuries with reasonable care. Cheaper grades of commercial yellow and white pines will deliver years of good service but only with constant care and regular refinishing.
Matching
It can sometimes be difficult to find suitable reclaimed wood stocks that match the grain, hue, and patina of existing wood in a renovation, or to find sufficient wood of a particular grade for use in a large-scale rebuild. White pines are easier to match because their less prominent grade and lighter hues (plus more plentiful stocks) make it easier to find similar woods.
At E.T. Moore, we’re experts at matching the yellow pines used in construction from the turn of the last century onwards with woods in our large selection of on-hand grades. We can also match genuine yellow pine heartwoods used in historic buildings from the 19th century or older. It’s not possible to match a new-growth yellow pine with an original heart pine in any grade.
Frequently Asked Questions
Want to know more about the differences between white and yellow pines? We answer your most common questions. How can you tell a yellow pine from a white pine?
As far as flooring goes, untreated yellow pine will typically be darker than white pine with a darker grain and more difference between the pale summer-growth and darker winter-growth bands. Yellow pine will also have rounder and darker knots and pinkish or honey-colored heartwood. Fast-growing white pine is made up almost entirely of lighter sap wood.
Which is harder white pine or yellow pine?
Yellow pine grows more slowly than white pine and therefore has tighter grains, making it a far harder (but less flexible) wood.
Is yellow pine wood durable?
Genuine southern yellow pine is among the hardest temperate softwoods, matching or even outperforming many deciduous hardwoods like maple or ash.
What is yellow pine lumber good for?
Yellow pine offers more durability and wear than white pine and a more distinctive finish. It’s ideal for long-lasting flooring provided it is properly seasoned and acclimated before installation. Decoratively it’s best for more traditional or rustic finishes.
E.T. Moore: Your Source for Quality Reclaimed Flooring
While many suppliers offer access to limited stocks of reclaimed white or yellow pine flooring, only E.T. Moore has the experience and deep inventory needed to match stocks for almost any project or renovation.
Whether you’re looking for the fresh, clean look of New England white pine or the down-home feel of classic southern yellow pine, trust E.T. Moore for the responsibly sourced, cleaned, and graded flooring your project deserves.
Talk to us about your reclaimed pine flooring needs. We’ll use our industry knowledge and unrivaled inventory to help you nail down a classic.