The static softening processes taking place after the hot working of polycrystalline pure nickel were studied by means of interrupted tensile tests and microhardness measurements as well as metallographic observations. The samples were deformed at 1050 K (0.61 T m ) and at 2 × 10 −3 s −1 to four levels of prestrain between 0.04 and 0.28. The effect of dynamically recovered (DR) and dynamically recrystallized (DRX) structures on the subsequent progress of static softening was analysed. The softening processes taking place in a DR matrix are classical recovery and classical recrystallization, and full softening can be achieved when the prior strain exceeds the critical strain required for static nucleation. By contrast, four separate softening mechanisms can be distinguished in a full DRX structure: classical static recovery and recrystallization, and metadynamic or post-dynamic recovery and recrystallization. Static softening after DRX proceeds very rapidly because of the operation of metadynamic recrystallization, which does not involve an incubation time. It cannot go to completion, however, because of the presence of metadynamically recovered grains, which are quite stable at high temperatures. Metadynamic recrystallization consists of the continued growth of DRX nuclei after deformation. Metadynamic recovery takes place in growing DRX grains containing a dislocation density gradient; the low density regions of these grains are below the critical strain level and thus have no potential for static nucleation. As a result of these inhomogeneous dislocation substructures, softening does not go to completion in DRX grains.