The selection of the components is important for the solid oxide fuel cells (SOFC) in order to address the sealing issues. In the present investigation, the glass composite seals have been prepared by mixing the different glass compositions in fixed ratio and then ball milling for 5h without using any unreactive particle in glass matrix. The chemical compatibility of the prepared glass composites with the solid electrolyte yttria stabilized zirconia (YSZ) has been studied using the scanning electron microscope (SEM) and dot-mapping techniques. The interfacial study has revealed that all the glass composites except GG5 have shown good adhesion along with no undesired chemical reaction at the interfaces. Furthermore, the thermal stress generated within the glass composite/YSZ diffusion couple has been simulated for 10000h heat-treatment at 800 degrees C along with its magnitude using the COMSOL multiphysics analysis. Interestingly, for all the diffusion couples, the stress is within the acceptable limit, but for the GG5 composite/YSZ couple, the stress varies between 6 and 529N/m(2). In addition to this, for the GG5 composite/YSZ couple, the interface exhibits a high stress zone, which shows good correlation with the microstructural analysis. Copyright (c) 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.