If you have decided to lay a new cement tile floor, then you need to put an underlayment down first. The first choices that may come to mind, like drywall, vinyl flooring, plywood, or particle, are not conducive to laying vinyl flooring on top of them. Instead, consider one of these three choices.
You may want to consider laying down a concrete slab. Consider the type of foundation under your home because you will need to decide if you need to brace it up before choosing this option. The slab needs to be perfectly flat, so you may need to put extra cement down in some places and grind other places off once the cement has set.
Another ceramic tile underlayment to consider is backer board. If the subfloor is not perfectly flat, then you may need to use mortar or a self-leveling option before putting down the backer board. This is a particularly popular option when put over a wooden subfloor. You will find a variety of choices available, including backer boards with cement cores that are designed for wet and dry situations along with fiber-cement backer boards that can be ideal if the area gets lots of heavy traffic.
The third solution is to create a mortar bed. This is a particularly popular option in smaller areas, like showers, but it can be used in larger areas. Laying a mortar bed can be difficult for novices because you need best ceramic tile underlayment to be flat before installing the ceramic tile.
