Materials guide
Most of the backyard bounce houses on GoJumps are residential: woven polyester, what listings call "nylon", held up by a blower that never stops. The commercial ones are PVC vinyl and pack at 112 to 143 pounds against 29 to 65 for fabric, and most of the other differences follow from that.
Below, the two compared on the units we list, in the makers' own figures: what they're made of, what they weigh, what keeps them up and what the warranty covers. Then the "commercial grade" label, which doesn't always mean what it seems to.
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The best-known residential unit on GoJumps and the heaviest commercial castle, with the numbers that separate them.
Residential: woven polyester
Packs into a 23 by 15 by 16 inch bag and holds three kids aged 3 to 8 on a 437 watt blower. Woven polyester and mesh walls: the residential recipe, and the most-reviewed unit in every search we ran.
View on AmazonCommercial: PVC vinyl
A 13 foot square castle with 15 ounce vinyl on the floor, sides and slide. At 143 pounds it's a two-adult job and a hand-truck ride, and its 800 pound limit is the highest on GoJumps.
View on AmazonMost residential units are woven polyester, often sold as Oxford cloth and graded in denier: Whubefy and Hongcoral mix 420D and 840D, and the higher number is the heavier yarn. Air seeps out through the seams by design (Little Tikes calls it normal), so the blower runs for as long as the unit is up. Some put a tougher floor where the wear is: Bounceland lists PVC-coated laminated Oxford on its Party Castle, Island Hopper pairs nylon with PVC on its Fort, and Blast Zone puts a commercial vinyl bounce floor on its Big Ol Bouncer.
Commercial units are PVC vinyl sheet, graded by weight. Pogo uses 15 ounce vinyl on the bounce area and 9 ounce everywhere else; the Cloud 9 uses 15 ounce on the floor, sides and slide. These run on a blower the whole time too, just a bigger one.
The pump-up toddler units are a third kind. The Intex Jump-O-Lene and the play yards on our toddler page are filled once with a pump and hold their air, and Intex warns that over-inflating may cause seam leaks.
Ranges come from the units on GoJumps: fabric means the woven polyester and Oxford units, vinyl the commercial castles and combos.
| Residential fabric | Commercial vinyl | |
|---|---|---|
| Material | Polyester or Oxford cloth, 420D to 840D | PVC vinyl, 9 to 15 oz |
| Packed weight | About 29 to 65 lb | 112 to 143 lb |
| Blower | 280 to 1,100 W | 680 W to 1.5 HP |
| Setup | One bag; 39 lb on the Little Tikes | Two adults, and a hand truck helps |
| Warranty | 30 to 90 days on most, a year on some blowers | Rental lines: 1 year (Pogo) to 3 years (JumpOrange, dry units) |
| Safety standard | ASTM F2729, for home use, ages 2 to 12 | ASTM F2374, for parks and rental companies |
More often the material than the use. The vinyl units on GoJumps are sold for homes. Pogo describes its Building Block as a Crossover, "engineered specifically for residential usage using commercial and rental grade materials," with 90 days on the inflatable and a year on the blower, then pitches the same Crossovers as entry-level units for new rental businesses. HeroKiddo's site calls its line rental grade, while the manual that ships with the Jelly Bean combos says its residential products are "Not use for public area or as a rental."
The fabric makers draw the same line around their own units. Bounceland's warranty is "only valid for normal home use and not for rental or other commercial use," Blast Zone voids its warranties under commercial or rental use, and Action Air's manual prints "NOT SUITABLE FOR HIRING OR COMMERCIAL USE."
The two classes even have separate safety standards. ASTM F2729 covers constant-air inflatables for private home use, for children from 2 to 12. ASTM F2374 covers commercial ones at amusement parks, family entertainment centers and rental companies, and it leaves home units out explicitly.
Thinking of renting yours out? That's a regulated business in several states, with permits, inspections and insurance (the rent or buy guide has examples), and the home warranties above end the day it starts.
For most families, fabric. It's light enough to carry in its bag, small enough to store on a garage shelf, and sized for the ages most backyard bouncing happens at; most picks on our bounce houses and toddler pages are fabric or sealed PVC.
Vinyl earns its weight when the kids are older and heavier, when it will come out most weekends, and when you have two adults to set it up and somewhere to keep 140 pounds of it. The commercial castles on our big kids page carry the highest limits on the site, up to 800 pounds on the Cloud 9.
