I stumbled upon the BEST floor paint for painting ceramic tiles! It was hard to believe how easy it was, and how well it has lasted!

I researched for hours on Pinterest to find the best floor paint for ceramic tiles. Now, I had a huge list of how to do it and what products I should purchase. I ran out to buy what I needed.

When I got to the Benjamin Moore counter at ACE, I told her what my project was and what I wanted to buy. This sweet girl looked at me like I had grown two heads! She told me that whatever I had read, she would NOT recommend me buying that product.

She said she would directly contact her Benjamin Moore rep and find out what they thought I should do. I’m SO glad I took her recommendation instead of blazing forward with a paint that might not hold up as well!

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Why would I paint a ceramic tile floor?

Money

I think the best reason to paint ceramic tiles is the budget friendliness of the option. It’s so crazy that for under $75, and in one day, you can have a completely different look! Changing the floor completely transforms a room.

Time

We had a few areas where we wanted to get rid of the dated floors. Unfortunately, we had so much going on that we didn’t have the time to renovate floors. The thought of pulling out toilets and renting a wet saw and learning a new skill was completely overwhelming when we had so many other things going on! We just didn’t have time to replace a floor!

Lacking skills

I love to try new projects and don’t mind failing my way forward. I know not everyone is like that, and so they would much rather hire someone to replace flooring for them. This can be expensive, and sometimes cost prohibitive. It also adds frustration because your room is out of use while that is being done! That leads to the last area…

Tide you over…

Oftentimes, I see people doing a quick job like this in order to tide them over until they can do what they really want to do. It seems that homeownership has no end of projects! Sometimes an outdated floor just needs a quick cover to give you time to focus on the bigger projects and spruce it up until you can address it.

This was the bathroom floor that we wanted to paint. It was showing so much wear after being painted by the prior owner. No matter how much we washed it, it always looked dirty. This little hack has been a GREAT way to tide us over until we are ready to fully renovate that bathroom.

What is the best floor paint for ceramic tiles?

Without a doubt, I say the best floor paint for ceramic tiles is Benjamin Moore Command FloorPaint. After the sweet sales girl at ACE checked with her Benjamin Moore rep, they let her know that they were just releasing their commercial floor paint to their residential line.

Because it was brand new, I had to special order it and wait for it to arrive but boy was it worth the wait! This is the paint that Benjamin Moore uses in manufacturing facilities where the lines run 24 hours a day and they don’t have time to wait forever for floor paint to dry. Plus, they need it to be super durable because they have forklifts running over it.

Those things work perfectly in the home setting too. Who can be without a bathroom for very long? And who wants to be repainting things because it’s all scratched up? It needs to be durable with kiddos and dogs.

I think you’ll love this paint, too!

Best way to paint ceramic floor tiles:

Sweep and Wash the Floor to be painted

I always like to start with a fresh, clean surface. I start by sweeping the floor and washing it just to make sure that I get any gunk off the floor.

Lightly Sand Floor

In this case, I was going over previously painted tiles. Ceramic tile or regular tile both need to be roughed up in order to accept the paint.

Take a rougher sandpaper – like 80-120 grit and just scuff it up. I didn’t use a palm sander or anything. I just had a piece of sandpaper in my hand and tried to scuff up the surface of all the tiles. If you have a super shiny tile, I’d be more aggressive with the sanding to make sure you get a good rough surface for the paint to adhere to.

Wash Floor with TSP

Wash it with TSP after sanding. This is a cleaner that I use on most of my painting projects. It does a stellar job of removing some of the finish, in addition to making sure it’s completely degreased.

Rinse Floor with Water

You’ll need to rinse the floor once or twice just to make sure that all the TSP has been removed from the surface. I think I did this twice just because I’m paranoid and I don’t want to mess up a job just because I’m in a hurry!

Let Floor Dry

I tried to make sure my floor was absolutely dry before I put that first coat of paint on. You can even put a fan on the surface to get it to dry faster. I also kept the door closed on the room from this point on so that I didn’t get any dirt or dust particles and hair on the floor before I painted.

Cut in With Paint brush

*IMPORTANT* Make sure you are starting in a corner and working your way toward the door. The worst thing you can do is to paint yourself into a corner and then step over fresh paint to get out!

I cut in the edges with a paint brush, using my Command Floor Paint. Then I used the paint brush to get all the lines between the tiles as well.

Paint Larger Areas with Small Roller

You can use a smaller roller to paint the tops of the ceramic tiles and to give a good roll over it all to make sure you don’t have any noticeable brush strokes if you’d like. I just used a brush since I had teeny tiny tiles and cutting in between them practically painted the whole floor!

Let the Freshly Painted Floor Dry for 1 Hour

I could not believe this part, but it was truly dry to the touch in less than a half hour and ready for a second coat an hour later! I did shut the door for this part as well, so no dust or dog hair blew in on my freshly painted surface.

Complete 2nd Coat of Paint

The second coat is just like the first! I wore clean socks to make sure I didn’t track anything in on the floor as I got to work on the second coat.

Let Painted Floor Dry for 24 Hours

After the 2nd coat, I closed the door one more time and let it dry for 24 hours. Then it was ready to use! This was such a fast project because from start to finish, it took just over a day!

Resume Normal Use

I used the floors gingerly the first day because I was scared – but my kids were not. They just tramped on them like normal and they were perfect!

*1 year update on the Best Floor Paint*

In a scurry of activity before my son’s graduation party last June, we painted the floor in the half bath on the main floor. This bathroom gets SO much traffic!

Not only does our family of 5 use it all day long – we homeschool so most of us are home throughout the day – but we also entertain a ton! We host a high school Lifegroup on Tuesday nights and our house has a revolving door for teenagers visiting our kids. So, we have more than our fair share of traffic in that room.

The crazy thing is that it still looks AMAZING!!!! I cannot believe how good it looks a year later. I thought there was a good chance that I would have to repaint it every year until we could replace it. But it looks like that will not be happening.

At one point, I thought there was a big scratch in the floor, but it turns out that there was just something stuck to it. I am actually completely shocked! I know Benjamin Moore promised it was amazing, but I’ve heard that before and have been disappointed by the results. So this was a very pleasant surprise for the paint to do exactly what they said it would do.

It’s not a paid advertisement. I just really am so happy that for once, a product did what was promised!!