Provided is a CdTe-based semiconductor substrate for epitaxial growth, which is capable of growing good-quality epitaxial crystals without urging a substrate user to implement etching treatment before the epitaxial growth.A CdTe-based semiconductor substrate, in which tracks of linear polishing damage with a depth of 1 nm or more are not observed within a viewing range of 10 μm×10 μm when a surface of the substrate is observed by an atomic force microscope, and orange peel defects are not observed when the surface of the substrate is visually observed under a fluorescent lamp, can grow the good-quality epitaxial crystals.