Tempered Glass vs Standard Glass

If you have been watching Netflix’s runaway hit “Squid Game”, you may have seen the episode in which the difference between tempered glass and standard glass plays a central role.

Not to spoil anything from the popular streaming series, but tempered glass is considered stronger than ordinary glass. It also has the additional safety feature of breaking into tiny, harmless pellets when broken, as opposed to the sharp shards that form when standard glass is shattered.

How Glass Is Made

Standard glass is composed of soda ash, lime, and sand that are heated up to a very high temperature until they crystalize, and then cooled. When this heating and cooling cycle is then repeated in a process known as annealing, the glass is cooled very slowly in order to remove internal stresses and build durability. The annealing process is what differentiates tempered glass from standard glass.

Automobile windshields, smartphone screens, and the glass used in commercial buildings are all made from tempered glass. So are the frameless shower doors made by TemperGlass. When they are accidentally cracked or shattered, rather than forming sharp shards these tempered glass break into smaller, less dangerous pieces.

Once broken, standard glass can be reworked — that is, melted down and reformed into a new pane of glass. That’s not the case with tempered glass.

Tempered Glass

Also known as safety glass, tempered glass shatters into pebble-like pieces that lack the sharp edges of traditional broken glass. The annealing process also makes the glass stronger and much more impact and scratch resistant compared to non-treated glass.

Hopefully, you will never have to worry about breaking your frameless glass shower doors by TemperGlass. But if it does happen, it’s reassuring to know that your glass shower doors will shatter into tiny, non-sharp pebbles that are less likely to cause harm.