Can I Lay Ceramic Tile Over Linoleum?

laying ceramic tiles
  • Beginner

When you are ready to lay ceramic tile in a room that already has a linoleum floor, it’s natural to be tempted to put the tiles over the linoleum floor to save yourself some work. However, if you do this, you will end up causing problems that will cost you more time to fix in the long run.

Potential Problems

Laying ceramic tiles over this type of floor is a bad idea for a few reasons.

Linoleum expands and contracts with the weather. This will crack your grout and loosen the adhesive holding down your tile.

Linoleum can also crack and peel when it is covered by another substance, causing your ceramic floor to come up.

Instead, the best approach is to remove the linoleum floor first and then apply your ceramic on a wood sub-floor.