A ceramic material suitable for use as a coating, such as a porous thermal barrier coating (TBC) on a component intended for use in a hostile thermal environments. The coating material consists essentially of zirconia stabilized by at least one rare-earth metal oxide and further alloyed to contain a limited amount of titania. Rare-earth metal oxides of particular interest are lanthana, ceria, neodymia, europia, gadolinia, erbia, dysprosia, and ytterbia, individually or in combination. Zirconia, the rare-earth metal oxide, and titania are present in the coating material in amounts to yield a predominantly tetragonal phase crystal structure. The amount of titania in the coating is tailored to allow higher levels of stabilizer while maintaining the tetragonal phase, i.e., avoiding the cubic (fluorite) phase.