Surface-leached sodium-silicate-glass beads have been tested for their gas-liquid chromatographic behavior and have been shown to be superior to the more commonly employed soda-lime compositions. Surface leaching of glass beads in general leads to a better distribution of liquid substrate and therefore to higher efficiencies. Leaching of the soda-lime glasses, however, causes a large increase in surface activity and therefore leads to notable tailing of the elution peaks for polar compounds. Sodium silicate glasses can be leached without the creation of the potentially active Ca++ Lewis acid sites, yielding a support material that is superior in both efficiency and peak symmetry.