Abstract Decapsulation of silver wire bonded packages with known techniques often results in damaged silver wires. The chemical properties of silver and silver compounds make silver bond wire inherently susceptible to etching damage by acid, conventional plasma, and oxygen-based Microwave Induced Plasma (MIP). In this paper we solve this problem by developing a specific decapsulation chemistry, based on a hydrogen-containing MIP, for artifact-free decapsulation of silver wire bonded packages.