There are a wide variety of tile coasters out there. They can range in material from ceramic, to slate, to marble, to glass tiles, and even mosaic pieces. They can also often either be printed with images, or left natural. There are even different textures available, with some coasters having a slightly graded clefting, and others being perfectly polished smooth.

Until recently the most common tile coasters that you would find were made of ceramic. That is because ceramic is a fairly hard and inexpensive material, that can also be inexpensively printed on. This allowed for the creation of literally millions of different sets of coasters, each with a unique or custom image printed right on the surface.

The problem with ceramic coasters is that they are flat and smooth, and the purpose of a coaster is to keep water from falling off of a glass and onto your table. Well when you put a sweaty glass down on a ceramic coaster, it slides all around, and the water can go splashing everywhere.

Marble tile coasters are similar products that were produced mostly by Italian factories. While marble in its more popular, polished form, is even more slippery than ceramic, in its natural unpolished form it is relatively textural.

The next innovation in tile coasters came in the form of sandstone. This material has a unique absorbent property, due to minute pores that are far too small to be seen which are found in the surface of the stone. This mixed with the sandy textural nature of the stone, made sandstone the perfect coasters material.

When you put a wet glass down on a sandstone coaster, you could actually see the water going into the stone, and the color of the material would darken. Then, over time, you could watch as the water evaporated away, leaving no mess behind at all.

The problem that arose with sandstone coasters is that the absorbent property also made them prone to staining, when a juice or other colored liquid was spilled on them.

Slate coasters are a recent development that tends to split the difference between sandstone and ceramic. Like sandstone slate is absorbent, however it is much less absorbent, with smaller pores that will not soak up liquids as easily. This means that slate can function as a coaster, holding the moisture on its surface, and gripping even the sweatiest glass, but if you spill something which isn't clear on them they generally won't stain right away.

Further, slate is usually available in what are known as multi-colors. This means that the surface of the stone has many different colors, all merging in a unique pattern, which is based on the chemicals which were present at the time of its formation.

Today tile coasters are some of the most popular pieces of functional home dcor available. They are usually relatively inexpensive, and they bring a certain natural flavor to a space. Further, modern printing, and even sandblasting techniques, allows for the imprinting of custom images on many of the most popular coasters materials.