Are Glass Desks Safe To Use? Here’s What Can Make Them Explode

We may receive a commission on purchases made from links.

Panslaos/Getty Images

Combining essential gadgets for your home office and a chic glass desk, you’ll be ready to tackle professional tasks with style, but is it safe? Glass desks are renowned for their ability to brighten an office and give the appearance of more space. Sleek and modern, a transparent surface made of glass not only looks stunning, but it’s relatively easy to maintain and won’t chip like wood.

However, the internet has been documenting increasingly startling accounts of these glass desks instantly shattering into thousands of tiny pieces. In fact, Reddit features several ongoing forums with people detailing their explosive experience with a glass desk. But are these work surfaces all ticking time bombs, or are there reasonable explanations for the sudden destruction?

First, when tempered glass shatters into tiny pieces, it’s actually a safety feature. Many glass surfaces also exhibit the same behavior when they have become compromised so as to avoid sizeable sharp-edged pieces from forming, creating a greater threat of bodily harm. But what causes them to shatter then?

Glass desks can become damaged by dramatic changes in temperature, blunt force, heavy-weighted items, or rough-textured objects sliding over the surface, creating near-invisible cracks. While tempered glass is stronger and able to withstand greater temperature fluctuations, damage can also occur as a result of defects that develop while being made. So, while it appears as if these glass desks shattered randomly, it’s more likely either a manufacturing blemish or damage occurred at an earlier time, worsening to the point of the glass failing.

What makes tempered glass so strong and why do imperfections matter?

According to ScientificAmerican, tempered glass is around four times more resilient than non-tempered glass. Because it’s made specifically to shatter into many smaller pieces to prevent harm, tempered glass is used in a variety of applications like shower doors, microwaves, and even in the best screen protectors for an iPhone 15 Pro Max. During the manufacturing process, this type of glass undergoes compressive force and high heating, and its surfaces are treated with agents to solidify its structure further. During the cooling step, a sort of tug-of-war between the center and outer portions of the glass occurs, which results in both tension and compression that permanently remain, creating a very robust material.

However, defects that aren’t discovered during the tempering cycle can lead to the exploding desk phenomenon. According to Glass.com, “After a fair amount of forensic analysis, it was determined that this breakage was occurring “spontaneously” due to imperfections in the glass (technically referred to as inclusions) that occur during the raw glass manufacturing process. Specifically, nickel sulfide inclusions may be developed or created when metal contaminants that are rich in nickel are accidentally mixed into the glass-melting furnaces during the time of glass processing.” Therefore, if you’re looking to buy a glass desk, you’d be wise to do some research into the company and its products, as the level of quality could contrast greatly between different brands.

How you can protect your glass desk from exploding

Other than your PC, monitor, and peripherals, you might consider keeping the desk free of non-essential items. If you have knick-knacks and other personal belongings you like to keep around, there are options like this affordable IKEA pegboard that could help tidy up your computer area. Remember that anything with sharp edges or some heft to it can cause problems if accidentally dropped or knocked over.

For those morning coffee lovers, a hot cup of joe sitting on your desk can create a concentrated area of heat on only a small portion of the glass. Any sort of drastic contrast of temperature creates an instability where as parts of the material expand while others shrink. When these expanding and shrinking sections come into contact, it creates pressure on the glass, which can lead to the exploding effect.

Fortunately, you can mitigate these temperature effects by using mats such as a Leather Desk Pad Protector or Leather Desk Mat. Covering a large section of your glass desk could hamper the aesthetics a bit but will help you protect the surface.