Glossary
Tile Setter Terms & Vocabulary
15 essential tile setter terms with plain-English definitions: the vocabulary you’ll hear in training and on day one.
Key tile setter vocabulary
These 15 terms come up constantly in tile setter training, on the job and in interviews. Knowing them helps you follow instructions, document accurately and sound prepared.
- Back-buttering
- Spreading thinset on tile backs.
- Backer board
- Cement board base.
- Coverage
- Thinset contact.
- Grout
- Fills joints.
- Large-format tile
- Tile 15 inches or more.
- Layout lines
- Guides for placement.
- Leveling clips
- Reduce lippage.
- Lippage
- Uneven tile edges.
- Movement joint
- Allows expansion.
- Porcelain
- Dense tile.
- Sealer
- Protects stone and grout.
- Shower pan
- Sloped base.
- TCNA Handbook
- Tile installation standards.
- Thinset
- Tile adhesive mortar.
- Waterproof membrane
- Shower barrier.
Practice these terms
Test yourself with the free Tile Setter practice test: it includes vocabulary questions built from this list. For a complete course, see Tile Setter training.
Browse terms from every career in our career glossary.