How does Gorilla Glass protect your device screen?

Personal devices, especially smartphones, aren’t just for bugging your friends and playing games; they’re vital social and professional lifelines, and a sudden screen burst could have disastrous consequences. This is why brands like Corning have achieved such a strong presence in the mobile space with protective screen coatings like Gorilla Glass. Through a proprietary physical and chemical treatment process, Gorilla Glass gains resilience without sacrificing flexibility, protecting your device from sudden drops and general wear and tear.

Thanks to the special way it is created and processed, Gorilla Glass can withstand the wear and tear of everyday life, as well as the occasional slip from your hand, all without making the device it’s attached to heavy or bulky. Of course, the success of Gorilla Glass has been accompanied by many other screen protection products, like Ceramic Shield, each putting its own twist on the protective treatment process. It’s a surprisingly competitive scene, but that’s good news for users because it means we’re getting a steady stream of more robust devices.

Gorilla Glass starts out as just a pile of silicon dioxide, better known as plain old sand. Sand and similar fine minerals harden into glass when exposed to intense heat. Corning combines this sand with a proprietary blend of chemicals, then melts it into a new substance called aluminosilicate. The molten aluminosilicate is then poured into a special trough until it begins to overflow, after which automated arms extract the glass sheets from the edges. Then the glass is put through a special chemical treatment process, in a bath of molten salt which exchanges the small sodium ions from the glass with the larger potassium ions from the salt. When the glass finally cools, these sandwiched ions create a compressive layer on its surface.

All this results in a very thin sturdy sheet of glass, about 0.3 to 0.5 millimeters thick, but with a sort of invisible cushion on both sides. Where normal glass is very rigid, shattering with too much sudden force or bending, Gorilla Glass has an extra degree of flexibility thanks to this layer of cushioning. A little extra flexibility can make a huge difference, as it allows the glass surface to safely absorb sudden impacts like drops, as well as withstand the constant banging and bending that comes with everyday phone use. The only major weakness of Gorilla Glass is that it is vulnerable to scratches from harder metals or minerals.

Since the launch of the first iPhone in 2007, Corning has become one of the leading names in protection for smartphones and tablets thanks to Gorilla Glass. However, just as smartphones themselves have become an extremely competitive market, Gorilla Glass is no longer the only screen protection on the market. Brands around the world have experimented with their own glass compositions, with a smartphone purchased in a particular country eventually being fitted with glass from a completely different brand.

Interestingly, one of Gorilla Glass’ biggest competitors is actually another Corning product, Ceramic Shield, which has been standard on iPhones since the iPhone 12. Ceramic Shield is created similarly to Gorilla Glass, but with the addition of ceramic nanocrystals to the molten glass to make the base glass stronger.

Given Corning’s dominance, some smartphone makers have started to move away from Gorilla Glass and toward in-house solutions. However, no matter where it comes from, there’s generally a good chance that if you buy a smartphone or tablet from one of the big proprietary brands like Apple or Samsung, it will have a layer of protection like Gorilla Glass or a comparable product protecting its screen.