Abstract: Damage precursors produced during grinding and polishing processes are the widely admitted damage initiators. Two models are built to examine the correlation between precursors and laser damage initiation. In the nano-absorber model, temperature field is simulated to describe the evolution of temperature at the hottest point within the pulse time. In the fracture model, electron density is calculated when the fracture surface is excited by laser shot. The results show that laser damage initiation and growth are strongly correlated with precursors.