Shower Types Compared: Alcove, Walk-In, Corner, Curbless and Wet Room

Most shower decisions come down to five layouts: alcove, corner, walk-in, curbless and wet room. They differ in how much floor they take, how they keep water in, how much glass they need and how easy they are to step into at eighty. This page compares them side by side so you can narrow the choice before you look at tile. The deeper pages on curbless showers and wet rooms cover the construction in detail.

The five types side by side

Alcove showers

An alcove shower sits between three walls with the entry on the fourth side. It is the natural replacement when a tub comes out, because the walls, drain location and often the framing are already there. That is why most tub-to-shower conversions end up as alcoves.

The trade-off is width. An alcove built in a tub space is as wide as the tub was long and only as deep as the tub was wide, which feels narrow to some people. You can choose a prefabricated base and wall panels, or build a tiled pan and walls. Either way, a curb and a door or curtain keep water in well, which makes alcoves forgiving in a small hall bath.

Corner showers

A corner shower uses two existing walls and closes the other two sides with glass, either square or with an angled front (often called neo-angle). It frees up wall space for a vanity or tub elsewhere in the room, which is why it shows up in primary baths that keep a freestanding tub.

Corner showers carry more glass than any other layout, so the glass is a bigger share of the cost and the cleaning. An angled front saves floor space at the entry but makes a smaller interior than its outside size suggests. Measure the inside, not the outside.

Walk-in showers

"Walk-in" is a loose term. In most showrooms it means a shower you enter without opening a door, past a fixed glass panel. Some have a low curb; some are curbless. What makes it work is length: the shower has to be long enough, and the showerhead placed far enough from the opening, that spray does not reach the bathroom floor.

A walk-in has no door hardware to adjust and no track to clean. It does let in more cool air than a closed enclosure, which some people notice in winter. Our shower glass and doors page covers fixed panels and how far they should extend.

Curbless showers

A curbless shower has no curb at the entry, so the bathroom floor runs straight into the shower. It is the most practical layout for anyone who uses a walker or wheelchair, or who expects to, and it makes a small room look larger because the floor reads as one surface.

The catch is construction. The shower floor still has to slope to a drain, so either the floor inside the shower is lowered into the framing or slab, or the rest of the bathroom floor is raised. The plumbing code also treats a curbless shower differently: under the 2021 Uniform Plumbing Code section 408.5, where a shower has no threshold, the floor space in the same room is considered a wet location. The curbless shower page explains both.

Wet rooms

A wet room waterproofs the entire bathroom floor, or a large zone of it, and slopes it to a drain, so the shower is simply an open area of the room. Often a tub sits inside the same wet zone. It suits a large primary bath where you want an open, spa-like space, and a small bath where there is no room for any enclosure at all. In a small room, though, the toilet, towels and toilet paper will get wet. The wet room page covers how it is built.

The size rule that applies to every type

Washington sets a minimum shower size. Under WAC 51-56-0400 (Washington's amendment to Uniform Plumbing Code section 408.6), a shower compartment must have a finished interior of at least 900 square inches and be able to contain a 30-inch circle. Washington lowered that from the model code's figure, so a quote that cites a larger minimum is using the wrong book. The rule has exceptions and a height requirement, which are on the bathroom plumbing code page.

Code minimum and comfortable are different things. The National Kitchen and Bath Association's planning guidelines recommend at least 36 by 36 inches inside a shower. That is a designer guideline, not a requirement, but it is a better starting point if you have the room.

Cost tier

An alcove with a prefabricated base and panels is usually the lowest-cost option, and a wet room the highest, because the waterproofing covers far more area and the floor often has to be rebuilt. In JDI Construction's published planning ranges, a walk-in or curbless shower is a $4,000-$10,000 add-on to a bathroom remodel and a full wet-room build is a $6,000-$14,000 add-on. These are planning ranges, not quotes; the whole-room ranges and what they include are on the bathroom remodel cost page, and shower-only work is covered under shower remodel cost.

Who should choose which

• Choose an alcove if you are replacing a tub, the room is a hall or kids' bath, you want the lowest cost, or you want a shower that keeps water in with no fuss.
• Choose a corner shower if the room needs its long walls for a vanity or tub and you are comfortable with more glass to clean.
• Choose a walk-in if you have length to spare (a primary bath or a long alcove) and want no door to open or maintain.
• Choose curbless if anyone in the home has trouble stepping over a curb now or may in the future, and the floor structure allows it. Our aging-in-place bathrooms page covers the other changes that go with it.
• Choose a wet room if you want an open shower and tub zone in a generous room, or need maximum access in a tiny one and accept that the whole room gets wet.

Questions to settle at the layout stage

• Where does the drain sit now, and can it move? Moving it adds plumbing work and cost.
• Is the floor framed lumber, engineered joists or a concrete slab? This decides whether curbless is practical.
• Which wall gets the valve, so you can turn the water on without stepping into the spray?
• Will anyone need to sit while showering? Plan a bench or fold-down seat now.
• How will the room ventilate? Larger open showers put more moisture into the room.

JDI Construction designs and builds every type on this page, from simple alcove conversions to wet rooms. Denise Lacquement, our bathroom designer, lays the options out on your actual floor plan with a 3D design before anything is ordered. To see how we approach it, visit our Vancouver shower remodeling page or read our article on planning a shower remodel.