Zirconia Toughened Alumina ceramic tile (ZTA ceramic tile ) is often used in wear applications as an intermediate solution between alumina and zirconia.

The main advantage of Zirconia Toughened Alumina ceramic (ZTA ceramic ) is the additional strength and toughness over alumina with a lower cost than zirconia (YTZP, MSZ, CSZ).

The combination of aluminum oxide and 10-20% zirconium oxide provides a much higher strength, toughness, hardness and wear resistance than alumina alone.

The 20-30% increase in strength often provides the design criteria needed at a much lower cost than using zirconia.

A process called transformation toughening is the phenomenon that increases the fracture toughness of ZTA. When placed under stress, the zirconia particles change their crystal structure from a tetragonal to a monoclinic structure, causing a volume expansion that compresses the surrounding crack in the alumina matrix.

ZTA ceramic should be considered for any application where structural strength is needed that exceeds the standard alumina properties.

ZTA ceramic tile provided a hiher strength compared than alumina,but the temperature limitation of 1500 degree must be observed.So ZTA ceramic tiles are mainly used in moist environments at temperature above 250C.