In choosing the best outdoor furniture for your needs, it is important to scrutinize both style and the materials used in manufacturing the furniture. With most outdoor furniture, the materials used usually dictate the style and specially the durability of the furniture.

Oak is probably the best and most traditional choice for outdoor furniture. Furniture made from Oak is considered to be of very good quality. A very good choice for outdoor furniture is Chinese oak. It is a very fine-grained and densely formed hardwood, with a pinkish tone on its interior and a heart that is a lighter shade of brown. Another good attribute of the Chinese oak is its tannic acid content. The tannic acid acts as a natural deterrent to fungus and insects. Chinese oak looks much like a very good quality of teak wood, and is known to be slightly more durable than the popular Red Oak.

Another very popular choice due to its rustic and warm appeal is the cedar. Cedar is classified as softwood but has the same tannic oil found in the Chinese oak. It serves as protection against mildew when the cedar wood is comes in contact with water. A lot of people prefer to use Cedar due to the fact that it is as strong and durable as oak but is lighter. The most popular form of cedar is natural red cedar. In fact, it is so popular that it is often reproduced using other materials. It is a good practice to check that the furniture you're going to buy is real red cedar and not just a very good look alike.

If youre looking for both durability and beauty, teak is a very good choice. Teak is a tight-grained hardwood known to be extremely durable. Teak is not only strong; it also has a very attractive appearance in a range of natural shades. Teak has rubber and natural oil content which provides extra protection against fungus that often times appears on wood that has been wet for a long period of time.

Teak is so durable that it can stand almost any weather all year long. Unfinished teak that is left to natures elements will turn into a lovely silvery-gray color. It may seem that furniture made from teak may need repainting at this point, but the truth is that paint wont be able to hold on to the wood properly due to the natural oil that is found in the wood.