The value of the armor was proven when the Defiant came up against Dominion forces. Like the Borg, the Dominion were able to penetrate Federation shielding systems relatively easily in the first years of hostility between the two powers, and the Defiant's ablative armor allowed the ship to withstand attacks that would have otherwise caused significant damage.

Recently there has been a massive revolution in this technology with the appearance of the ablative armor generator. This device was given to the crew of the U.S.S. Voyager by a future version of Admiral Janeway, who traveled back in time to the ship in order to assist them in returning home from the Delta Quadrant. The generator involves a series of devices placed onto the hull of a vessel; when activated these replicate a layer of armor over the surface of the ship. The effectiveness of armor is considerable. The system Voyager employed was able to withstand a simultaneous attack by several Borg cubes. One of the most useful features of this system is that as it can be materialized and dematerialized as needed, even weapons systems can be covered over when they are not actually in use. This gives a much greater degree of coverage than any standard armor protection which must leave permanent apertures to operate such systems through.

At time of writing Starfleet had had relatively little time to asses this technology, but the ease with which it was adapted for use on Voyager without spacedock or any outside support indicates that it should be reasonably easy for the remainder of Starfleet's ships to create ablative armor generators for themselves. This should multiply the hull strength of the fleet massively at a single stroke.