Tungsten disilicide can react violently with substances such as strong acids, fluorine, oxidizers, and interhalogens.
The deposited film is non-stoichiometric, and requires annealing to convert to more conductive stoichiometric form.
Tungsten disilicide is also of value towards use in microelectromechanical systems, where it is mostly applied as thin films for fabrication of microscale circuits.
For such purposes, films of tungsten disilicide can be plasma-etched using e.g. nitrogen trifluoride gas.
In particular, in similarity to Molybdenum disilicide, MoSi2, the high emissivity of tungsten disilicide makes this material attractive for high temperature radiative cooling, with implications in heat shields.