Plasma-based atomic layer etching is a cyclical etching process of gas dosing and surface bombardment that removes material layer by layer, and has the potential to remove single atomic layers with low damage. The authors consider how a conventional plasma etcher can be modified to perform this style of recipe and give results for a range of materials: Si, MoS₂, GaN/AlGaN. The need for precise control of ion bombardment energy and gas dose is highlighted, requiring specialised hardware.