Quartz glass is an amorphous material composed solely of silicon dioxide. Its microstructure is a simple network composed of silicon dioxide tetrahedral structural units. Due to the high Si-O chemical bond energy and tight structure, quartz glass has unique properties, especially the excellent optical properties of transparent quartz glass, which has excellent transmittance in the continuous wavelength range from ultraviolet to infrared radiation.

High-purity silica sand is used as the raw material for quartz glass. The traditional method of making it is the melting-quenching method (heating the material to the melting temperature and then rapidly cooling it to the solid state of the glass); making ultra-high purity and ultraviolet transmittance transparent glass requires processes such as vaporization of silicon, oxidation to silicon dioxide, and heating and dissolving.

The formation of quartz glass is a result of its high viscosity at high temperatures. It is used to manufacture semiconductors, electro-optical sources, semiconductor communication devices, lasers, optical instruments, laboratory instruments, electrical equipment, medical equipment, and high-temperature, corrosion-resistant chemical instruments, and is widely used in the chemical, electronic, metallurgical, building materials, and national defense industries.

High-purity quartz glass can be used to make optical fibers.

With the development of semiconductor technology, quartz glass has been widely used in various processes of semiconductor production. For example, the Czochralski method is used to convert polycrystalline silicon into single-crystal silicon; cleaning tanks are used for cleaning; diffusion tubes and grooved boats are used for diffusion; and bell jars are used for ion implantation, etc.

Quartz glass is a special type of glass containing only silicon dioxide as a single component. Due to the different types, processes, and raw materials, it is often called silicate glass, quartz glass, fused quartz, fused quartz, synthetic fused quartz, and transparent, translucent, and opaque quartz without clear concepts abroad. In China, it is collectively referred to as quartz glass, and it is often classified according to the process method, use, and appearance, such as electrically melted transparent quartz glass, continuously melted quartz glass, gas-refined transparent quartz glass, synthetic quartz glass, opaque quartz glass, optical quartz glass, semiconductor quartz glass, and electro-optical quartz glass. It is inappropriate to use the simple term "quartz" to name this material because "quartz" is a general term for the crystalline state of silicon dioxide, which is different from vitreous silicon dioxide in its physical and chemical properties.