The coarsening of duplex stainless steel microstructures at temperatures above 1000°C was investigated experimentally and theoretically. Hot-rolled duplex 2205 and superduplex 2507 samples were heat treated isothermally at 1100°C up to 700 h, and also between 1000 and 1250°C for 24 h. The ferrite content and the microstructure coarseness, quantified by the measured austenite spacing, AS, were evaluated. It was found that the observed coarsening could be described using Ostwald ripening theory expressed as AS n-AS0 n=kt, where AS0 is austenite spacing of the as-delivered material, k the rate constant, n the exponent, and t the heat treatment time. Using regression analysis, n and k were evaluated and the resulting predictions compared with literature theories and results. The results were also calculated according to the original Lifshitz, Slyozov, Wagner (LSW) theory with parameters taken from literature, as well as with the Dictra software for diffusion and growth in multicomponent systems. The calculations indicated that while the classical LSW theory failed to give a good description of the experimental results, the Dictra simulations proved very accurate, even though systems of equal ferrite and austenite content are considerably outside the intended range of applicability of the software. © 2013 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.