Ozone-based HF chemistry is proposed to substitute the conventional HF/HNO3 mixture for polysilicon stripping in wafer reclamation. The etching characteristics of ozonated HF solutions are investigated. Similar to its HF/HNO3 counterpart, HF/O3 was found to strip polysilicon films through a simultaneous oxidation-and-etching process. The strip rate was determined by the rate-limiting step in the competition between the oxidation and etching reactions; whichever slower would govern the overall kinetics. Because of the nonstop etching nature of the chemistry on both silicon and silicon oxides, the feasibility of the process application is evaluated, based on the etch selectivity between the polysilicon and the underlying thermal oxide.