Glass has become one of the most popular and complex building materials used today, because of virtually unlimited aesthetic options, combined with outstanding performance. The growing interest of contemporary architecture to use glass in large façade surfaces raises technical issues. In order to propose reliable engineering solutions in glass constructions, understanding the failure mechanisms is vital. The vast majority of the occasional failures of glass panes in facades are caused by other factors than the loads allowed for in design codes. Thermal breakage is one of these reasons. Glass in the vision and non-vision areas of a façade expands in response to the heat of the sun. Internal thermal stresses are developed when glass is subjected to variations in temperature across its area. The edges of the glass are encased within the rebate of the frame and are therefore protected from the direct heat of the sun, they heat up more slowly and expand less. If the temperature difference between the main area of the glass and the edges causes the development of stresses that exceed the glass strength, the glass may crack. This is referred to as thermal breakage. Thermal actions are simplified in literature and the standards and fatigue of a glass is not accounted for. Only simple façade configurations are taken into account, while they are non-applicable to double skin facades. Current literature is not detailed enough, finite element software studies need to be used to examine the temperature difference in glass façades and the induced stresses. The hereby MSc thesis explains the principle of thermal fracture and gives an awareness toward recognizing this type of failure and preventing its occurrence. In order to reduce the risk factor in thermal calculation methods, standards and software used in the industry were examined as part of a literature review. The practice of different calculation methods is elaborated for French, British, Belgian and European standard. The focus of the study is on analyzing the glass behavior under solar radiation with experimental procedures, examine and compare with previous numerical investigations and estimate the magnitude of thermal stresses calculated with different methods.