Mechanical performance and consumer product safety have been major drivers for glass research and innovation. Commodity glass materials are brittle and, thus, their mechanical performance is extremely sensitive to the presence of microscopic flaws and defects at their surface: the extent by which surface flaws reduce the practical strength of glass products exceeds the effect of any optimization in glass composition by several orders of magnitude. 1 Strength-reducing flaws are created already during glass manufacture 2,3 : the intrinsic strength levels which are expected from theoretical considerations can be approached experimentally only on carefully drawn glass fibers which are basically free of microscopic defects. 4,5 For other types of glass products, processes such as acid-or fire-polishing are often applied in order to create defect-free surfaces. Such post-processing does not only reduce the presence of surface defects or flaws on pristine glass articles, but may also lead to a more persistent enhancement of product durability by generating surface gradients in chemical composition, mass density and residual stress.The most prominent post-processing methodologies for enhancing the strength of glass products rely on diffusive