The Advantages of Bi-Fold Hinges

No Mortise

• Bi-fold door hinges lie flat against the door surfaces. Hinges for closet doors that open out like a regular door require an indentation cut into the door so the hinge panel doesn't stick out further than the surface of the door. Because bi-fold hinges don't require that, you can install the hinge yourself without having to worry about your chiseling skill, which in turn reduces the time you need to spend on the door. If something happens to the hinge and you have to replace it, you won't have to deal with finding the exact same shape of hinge or filling in the old indentation and chiseling a new one.

Line of Sight

• The flat bi-fold door hinge folds up enough so that you get the maximum view possible of your closet. Sliding doors block part of the closet because, when you move a door out of the way, you're really just pushing it in front of another part of the closet. Bi-fold hinges fold flat enough that the doors fold back as far as possible without anything preventing the inner panel from touching the outer panel of the door.

More On-Track

• While it's possible for anything on a track to go off-track, bi-fold doors have less of a risk of sliding off-track. Sliding doors on tracks can catch on the bottom track if the bottom track ridges become bent or filled with debris. HomeRepairGeek.com notes the top track can become a problem if the mounting screw wasn't tightened enough, leading to unevenly installed doors. Bi-fold doors also won't swing out as they move, like some sliding closet doors can, if they aren't set in a bottom track. Bi-fold doors are attached to the top and bottom of the closet opening by hinges and brackets bolted into the frame and floor, and these hinges along with the roller steady three corners of the two-panel door, providing more of a guide for the door's movement.