Will polishing remove ceramic coating?
Quick answer: Yes, abrasive polishing will remove (or at least thin) a ceramic coating. A light hand polish might be useful without cutting deep into the coating, but machine polishing would require a reapplication of your coating afterwards. If you only want to deep-clean without removing the coating, stick to decontamination and non-abrasive cleansers.
If, for some reason, we need to remove a ceramic coating, the only way for us to do it is to machine polish it off using aggressive abrasive compounds. We have done this when an area of a ceramic coating went cloudy on application, and it wasn't easy.
If your coating is a few years old and starting to show wear, polishing is exactly how we strip it back so we can reapply. On the other hand, if you polish a car that still has a healthy coating, you’ll cut into it and reduce or completely remove its protection. That’s why we don’t normally recommend polishing coated cars unless there’s a good reason, for example, to correct scratches or fix an area that’s been damaged.
So the answer is yes, polishing will remove it, but it would take a lot of polishing to do it fully, especially if you are polishing by hand using retail products which are very mild. But you really shouldn't polish over a ceramic coating, it generally isn't helping. If you have some issue with the finish to your vehicle which makes you feel it needs a polish, you should take it back to where you had the coating applied and ask them for advice.
Written by Danny Argent. Last updated 23/09/2025 14:54