Abstract The roles of hot electrons and holes in dielectric breakdown of the thin gate oxide have been quantitatively investigated in this paper, The changes of threshold voltage have been discussed under different stress conditions. This paper is the first report that points out the cooperation of hot electrons and holes is essential for the time dependent dielectric breakdown in thin gate oxide. A detailed theory analysis is made and a two-step models of thin gate oxide is presented. The first step is injected hot electrons create trap centers in thin gate oxide, and the second step is thin gate oxide breakdown induced by hole trapping.