How to Cut Porcelain Tile for an Electrical Outlet

Turn off the electricity in the room by accessing the breaker box and flipping the breaker for that room. Try to turn on a light or an appliance to test that the electricity is off before continuing.

Remove the screws from the plate that covers the electrical outlet. Pull the plate off of the wall.

Slide tile spacers into the tiles around the electrical outlet, if you don’t have them in place already. Line the first tile up with the tile spacer at one corner of the electrical outlet and hold the tile in place against the wall, so that the other corner of the tile overlaps the corner of the outlet hole.

Slide a piece of graphite or a short pencil behind the tile and mark the backside of the tile so that the marks line up with the edges of the electrical outlet opening as much as possible. Take the tile down from the wall.

Cut the tile down with a tile saw. Cut just inside the marks that you made to leave a little bit of excess tile to overhang the electrical outlet.

Move along the outlet hole to the next section of the wall for which you need to cut a tile. If the wall doesn’t include a corner, simply line the tile up with the tile spacers and mark the back with a straight line. Cut the tile to size with the tile cutter.

Complete all of the corners around the electrical outlet the way that you cut down the first tile. For any straight tiles that you need to cut down, you can use the first straight tile that you cut as a guide to measure and cut down the tiles.

Apply thin set mortar to the wall with a putty knife and place all of the tiles into their place once they have been cut down. Allow the cut edges of the tiles to overhang the electric outlet.