The major in-service failure mechanisms of modem optical coatings for architectural glass can be mechanical (e.g. scratch damage). Many of these coatings are multilayer structures of less than 100 nm thickness and different coating architectures are possible (i.e. different layer materials, thickness and stacking order). These coatings are exposed to different types of climatic conditions. In such circumstances it has been shown that chemomechanical effects can lead to changes in the hardness as well as the fracture resistance of bulk oxides. High performance glass is coated with anti-reflection coatings (e.g. ZnO, SnO2) and barrier layers (e.g. TiOxNy) which are also expected to suffer from such chemomechanical effects. In this study we have demonstrated the chemomechanical behaviour of a range of optical coatings exposed to water. Water exposure tends to reduce the hardness and increase the fracture resistance of the coating making it more vulnerable to plastic deformation during scratching. The susceptibility of different coatings to chemomechanical effects is discussed. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.