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Quantifying the thermal response of a heat shield is a key step in the design of a spacecraft to ensure its survivability during atmospheric entry. Recession and swelling of the thermal protection material have a drastic effect on both the heat transfer within the vehicle and aerothermodynamic transients. Post flight analysis of reentry can be achieved after recovery on Earth, but it is more difficult for entries on other bodies of the solar system. A dedicated instrumentation is necessary to understand the evolution of the thermal protection material thickness during flight. This paper investigates the current limitations of the available measurement techniques. A low-mass passive solution is proposed to measure with high accuracy the phenomena of recession, also valid for materials only subject to sublimation such as polytetrafluoroethylene, and swelling. The QARMAN CubeSat mission provides a flight opportunity to develop a dedicated payload to quantify the recession and swelling of an