8 in. Floating Shelf Bracket, Hidden Brackets for Wood Shelf (12-Pack)

These are good brackets for mounting floating shelves. They are sturdy and can bear a bunch of weight! The individual brackets allow you to place these where there are studs and where you need the most bracing. I like to center these on the stud and drill each hole at an angle into the wall. This way the screws can penetrate the stud from both sides of the bracket.

These shelf brackets can be used to create a 'floating shelf', that is a shelf with no visible means of support. Two or more holes are horizontally drilled in an appropriately sized shelf, the brackets are affixed to the wall the same distance apart, and the shelf is slid onto the rods. The product includes 24 shelf brackets, drywall and concrete anchors, and screws. This is enough for 12 shelves if two brackets are used per shelf. There was no documentation included with the brackets, but the listing on the Home Depot web site says they can support 110lbs, I assume that is per pair. As noted, there are no instructions included, one has to figure it out. The brackets fit a 1 1/2" board (i.e. 2x4) by 9" wide or larger. The installer is responsible for layout, no templates are provided. That being said, after drilling the holes for the brackets. I used a piece of painters tape to transfer the hole layout to a board and used that to locate the spot to drill for the rod. I installed this into a concrete block wall and did not use the provided anchors as I prefer concrete screws over concrete anchors. That being said. for those wishing to install into a framed wall, the screw holes provided will not fully engage a 2x4 stud. I would suggest placing the anchors so one screw goes into a stud and the other using a drywall anchor to provide the maximum support. After drilling the hole for the rod using a 1/2" drill bit, the shelf slid easily over the rods. There is not a provided mechanism to secure the shelf to the rods, in hindsight I should have drilled them just slightly wider than the rods so there would be some tension. I am going to order a 15/32" drill bit and see if that also works. Drilling a pin or set screw hole would also work. Overall, this is pretty solid. There is a slight deflection in the shelf as pressure or weight is applied to the edge. As long as the weight is evenly distributed it should be fine and I doubt if it will fall off. If one lives near railroad tracks, one may want to investigate using something to keep the shelf from sliding off.

I requested this set of floating shelf brackets for our 102 year old home to address the serious lack of storage and wall display options throughout the house. Upon opening the first bagged bracket, I found a lackluster paint job, heavy scuff marks, and even gouging at least 1mm deep into the steel. While several brackets together shouldn't struggle combined, it would make me reconsider putting the manufacturer max rated load on the shelf held by the brackets.

These floating shelf brackets look good, but definitely need some improvements to be useful in most situations. The good: they are attractive, appear to be well made and come with really good drywall anchors. Now for the not so good….. The main problem with these brackets is they do not come with any means of securing the shelf to the bracket. A clamp would be nice to include, or at the very least drill some holes in the bracket to attach the shelf and keep it from sliding. I will use my drill press to make holes for this, but I should not have to. The would be an issue on mounting any shelves, even in a nook where it wouldn’t slide side to side, but would be able to slip off the brackets in the forward direction. I was planning to use these to build shelves for our kittens to climb and jump, but there is no way that would be wise. These brackets look good, but without modifications they are not of any real value for my needs.

These are very well built and have a nice finish as well. Also comes with many options for securing to a wall with Mollies of different types and sizes. Also comes with the mounting screws. They are a full 8" OAL, with the rod length 7 3/4". Overall nicely made. The problems are 2 fold. If you wanted to mount it to a stud behind the wall, the hole centers are too wide to do that so you must use the molly method. Then there are also no instructions as to distance between them to mount. And unless you have a very nice drill press, I don't think they can be drilled or layed out by hand. Since the rod is only a few thousands under 1/2", if you miss any at all between 2 or more rods, the shelf won't go on. If you drill the hole bigger to help, then it slants forward.

Order these for use in a build for a customer’s floating shelves. Shelves where solid cherry wood and these brackets held the weight perfectly. Highly recommended.

Had a 1 1/2 live edge shelf for kitchen 8 to10 inches wide 10 ft long. Put 10 pegs in the wood and recommended mounting screws. Put board up and the pegs pulled right out of wall