Microfiber leather fabrics are synthetic (leather) materials of polyurethane and microfiber fabrics. With advanced manufacturing techniques, microfiber leather is more stretchable, flexible, durable and, importantly, air-permeable. As fabric for shoes, durability of microfiber leather against stains, dust, and wear is ideal to be a perfect choice. Further, microfiber leather is widely used in footwear, garments and upholstery because of its stably outstanding features and being more environment-friendly and cheaper compared with authentic leather.
Microfiber leather is taken as the third generation of synthetic leather (or faux leather), also the upgrade of PU leather. Since the synthetic leather has been invented out, we people who are in this field have been devoting to make it more and more close to real leather, not only in outlook, but also in feeling and performance.
Until now, microfiber leather should be the most similar one with real leather. Why? The key factor may be how well the skin layer and second layer of synthetic leather integrated, just like the real leather. As upgrade version of PU leather, microfiber leather uses microfiber fabric as backing fabric (integrated by nonwoven fabric and nylon fiber) which has more microporous to make PU slurry easy to penetrate in. Because the thickness of microfiber is only 1% of human hair cross section, very close to genuine leather.
What’s the advantage of microfiber leather? We can compare microfiber leather with real leather and PU leather in below aspects:
Properties |
Real leather |
Microfiber leather |
PU leather |
Hand feeling |
Soft, but not flat and smooth enough |
Similar with real leather, flat and smooth |
Flat and smooth, but less similar with real leather |
Breathable |
Excellent breathability |
Similar breathability with real leather |
Poor than microfiber leather |
Anti-bacteria and anti-odour |
Real leather has odour itself because it’s from animal skin |
Excellent performance in anti-bacteria and anti-odour |
Good performance in anti-bacteria and anti-odour |
Light-weight |
Heavy |
Light |
Light |
Water-repellent |
Excellent water-repellent |
Excellent water-repellent |
Good water-repellent |
Eco-friendly |
Harmful to animals and environment during processing |
There is no harmful solvent used during microfiber leather production and the materials are totally vegan |
Water-based PU leather and solvent free PU leather is eco-friendly. |
Health |
Harmful to human health, because most real leather has high Chrome VI which must be used during traditional production |
Does not contain eight heavy metals, azo AZO and other substances harmful to the human body |
No harm to human health |
Price |
Expensive |
Only 30% price of real leather, and has higher utilization |
Cheapest in these three |
Besides, we have tested microfiber leather and PU leather for shoes with same thickness to see the differences. Below is the test report.
Physical Test Report |
|||
Item Name |
Microfiber Leather |
PU leather |
|
Tear Strength(N) |
Warp |
113 |
33.3 |
Weft |
106 |
49 |
|
Tensile Strength(N) |
Warp |
483 |
196 |
Weft |
380 |
235.2 |
|
Elongation (%) |
Warp |
79 |
9 |
Weft |
113 |
32 |
|
Peeling(KG/3CM) |
Warp |
9.3 |
2.1 |
Weft |
9.3 |
1.8 |
|
Fold resistance(times) |
Normal |
200,000 |
100,000 |
Weight(GSM) |
636 |
530 |
|
Thickness(MM) |
1.4 |
1.4 |
From the test report, we can tell that the performance of microfiber leather is quite excellent. It has outstanding tear strength, tensile strength, elongation, peeling strength, fold resistance and so on. Besides, we also have microfiber leather with better functions to meet customers’ different requirements, for example: fire retardant, cold resistance, acid resistance, alkali resistance.
During the growing of science and technology, microfiber leather is able to be used for abundance products, including: shoes, upholstery, car interior, yacht, bags, and also anything you want to make, we just need to change some properties of the microfiber leather.
According to previous comparisons and reports, it’s not hard to understand why products made from microfiber leather are better. For example:
Microfiber leather shoes are good for sports, because it can hold up against different weather conditions and hard to wear-out during long time outdoor activities. And microfiber leather shoes are lighter and breathable which will be very comfortable.
Microfiber leather upholsteries are more soft and easy to clean. And microfiber leather is very suitable for luxury style upholsteries which have high end outlook and excellent touch feeling.
For customers who want eco-friendly, good performance and cost efficient leather, microfiber leather is a wonderful choice.