How to Install Peel and Stick Metal Backsplash from The DIY Decor Store

Prime your wall before you apply your tiles and let the primer dry. If you skip priming, you need to use constructive adhesive to attach the tiles. Priming is faster and easier than applying construction adhesive to every single tile.

I would recommend having your primer tinted to match the colors of your tiles. I made a couple of mistakes so there are TINY gaps in one or two spots. The white primer shows through. If the primer had been tinted, the mistake would have been impossible to see (in fairness, it’s still pretty hard to see).

Yes. As long as you follow the directions to use primer first or to use construction adhesive, your tiles should stay on. The adhesive is STRONG. In fact, it’s so strong that you’re going to have a few potential hurdles to overcome.

Once you stick the tile down, press down firmly for a few seconds to make sure it’s adhered everywhere.

The ONLY exceptions I had to tiles not sticking were user related (more info below).

I tried this in a few places with mixed results. The problem is that the adhesive is VERY strong and if you let the adhesive “catch” the wall at all, it’s hard to pull off. You need to be able to slide the tile into a tight spot WITHOUT it catching first.

For the most part, I’d suggest just using trim. We did work out a method at the end though… I WOULD NOT recommend this in MOST situations. We had a really tight area with a weird curve of molding for a cabinet (in the laundry room above the sink). There was no way we could cut the curve with tin snips.

Instead we used our JobPlus tool to cut away at the end of the trim, leaving a small area to stuff the edge of the tile into. We left the sticker on the part of the tile that was going under the trim. This prevented it from sticking as we inserted it. The sticker for the rest of the tile was removed to stick to the wall once the trim was inserted. I hope that makes sense!

It’s not the best method of doing this because you risk your tile not adhering properly and possibly popping up later.

The other thing you could try is leaving the sticker on the back of the tile, sliding it behind the trim into the location you want, then trying to pull the sticker off while the tile is in place. This worked in a few spots for me, but it’s tricky.

The pictures below show two tricky spots where we managed to shove the edges behind the cabinet/trim. The first photo is before we cut away the trim. We cut just enough by the wall to slip the tile behind it.

If only a bit of the tile sticks, you can pull it off the wall. You may pull off some of the paint/wall with it if it’s too stuck.

When you pull it off, you’ll find that the metal tile bends and the tiles may come apart from the adhesive layer. If the tile was stuck down well and you remove the tile, you likely won’t be able to reuse the tile.

I had a few small strips that didn’t stick well; this was caused because I pulled the tile off the wall to fix its position and the tile pulled away from the adhesive backing. Most of the tile was fine, but one strip came apart. I used a knife to cut away just the strip, then cut a same sized strip off a piece of tile that was leftover, and placed it in the spot. This is a GREAT way to fix any cosmetic issues.

You need to use a level for the first couple of rows to ensure that your tiles are straight and level with the ground. I recommend starting your tiles from the floor up if you’re doing a whole wall.

Once you have those first rows added, you’re simply placing your next tiles right above the first row. Complete ONE ROW AT A TIME. Make sure they’re tight against the tile below before you stick them down.

This is a bit tricky, but once you get the hang of it, it’s pretty fast and easy. For a new row, I would place the tile on the left most point. When placing it, I would use a little pressure to pull the tile low so it was snug up against the row below it. I tried to adhere from left to right on each tile, snugly pulling up or down on the tile to ensure a good fit.

For the next tile in that row, I would place the left side of the tile against the right side of the previous tile, ensuring they were snug against each other with no gaps. Then I would slowly move from left to right (on that one piece of tile), pulling the tile snug against the bottom tile as I adhered little by little. This sounds slow, but you move pretty fast.

This is a pretty important consideration. You don’t want all of your tiles to line up. The tiles should be staggered and random (unless you’re going for a different look- you might be able to do something creative with the designs).

For my first row, I cut a shorter piece of tile. Then I would use a full tile. Then I used a piece cut to the remainder of my width for that wall. The leftover piece from row 1 can be used for row 2. You can mix things up with the lengths.

You should also pay attention to the designs on your tiles. You may want to flip them over or arrange them so certain colors don’t form obvious patterns.

What this boils down to is that you need to cut tiles one by one. Precutting won’t work well for this project.

You’ll need trim to cover the sharp edges. You want to always place your cut edges on the far outside of your wall so they’ll be covered by trim.

For example, for my wall I might have short cut, full tile, full tile, short cut. The raw edges are always to the outside this way. You don’t want a raw edge in the middle of your wall.

If you want, you can use a metal file on the sharp edges, but I wouldn’t do that as an alternative to covering the edges. You’ll still want the edges covered to be safe.

I found that cutting metal with a miter saw was touchy, although perhaps a different blade would have done a better job. I used a lot of safety equipment and still felt like I was under protected. You’ll be dealing with sparks and metal shards. It’s not an indoor job.

Cutting with tin snips felt much safer, but you need to make sure not to cut yourself; The tin snips are sharp. The raw edges of the tiles are sharp. I recommend using gloves. You may also want to wear eye protection.

Remove the outlet covers for your outlets. You want your metal tiles placed where the outlet cover will cover the edges, but where the whole outlet can be pulled out if needed. Usually the “outlet” is a blue box. That piece may need to come out if electrical work is done. Don’t block it.

The best way I found to go around the outlets was to place my tile pieces row by row. This allowed me to cut areas to length without cutting out a random square in the middle of the tile (this is pretty much impossible IMHO).

Photo 1: I positioned the outlet cover where it would be placed on the tile. Then I taped the area so I knew what areas to avoid cutting into.

Photo 2: I cut the strips apart and cut where necessary. This is easy to do strip by strip.

Photo 3: I adhered the strips piece by piece, stopping to cut off excess when needed.

Photo 4 & 5: Photos of how I placed the strips around the outlets.

Once I finished, I mounted the outlet covers back on. You may need to adjust how much your outlet sticks out. I needed to fix one outlet, but two were fine.