After a windstorm, many homeowners check the roof, see every shingle in place and assume they got lucky. But one of the most common kinds of wind damage leaves the shingle right where it was. It just leaves a crease.

What a Crease Is

Asphalt shingles are held down by nails and by an adhesive sealant strip that bonds each shingle to the one below. In strong wind, the tab can break free of that seal and flap upward. If it bends far enough, it folds and leaves a visible horizontal line across the shingle. When the wind stops, the tab usually lies back down, so from the street the roof looks normal.

Why Creases Matter

  • The seal is broken. A tab that has lifted once catches wind more easily next time.
  • The shingle is weakened. The fold cracks the asphalt and fiberglass mat along the crease line.
  • It leads to missing shingles. Creased tabs often tear off entirely in the next storm.
  • It opens a path for water. Wind-driven monsoon rain can get under a lifted tab and reach the nails and underlayment.

How to Spot Creased Shingles

  • A straight, horizontal line across a tab, usually a few inches up from the bottom edge
  • Tabs that sit slightly higher than their neighbors or don't lie flat
  • Missing granules along a line on the shingle
  • Broken sealant, visible as a clean strip where the shingle was bonded
  • Creases clustered on the side of the roof facing the storm, and along rakes, ridges and edges

Creases can be hard to see from the ground, even with binoculars. Please don't walk the roof to look. Read why getting on your roof after a storm is risky.

Hand-sealing and new roofs: sealant strips need heat from the sun to bond. Shingles installed in cold weather may not seal until warm weather arrives, which leaves them more vulnerable to wind in the meantime. Good installers hand-seal where needed.

Creases and Insurance Claims

Because creased shingles are still on the roof, they can be missed in a quick inspection. An inspector should look for them specifically and photograph them, showing the crease line, the broken seal and where they sit on the roof. Clusters of creases on the storm-facing slopes point to wind rather than age. For more, see wind damage or old age: how adjusters tell the difference.

Can Creased Shingles Be Repaired?

A creased shingle can't be un-creased. The fix is to replace it. A few scattered creases can be handled as a repair if matching shingles are available. Widespread creasing across several slopes usually means the roof has lost much of its wind resistance, and replacement may be the better option. See our wind damage repair page and repair vs. replacement.