<p>In industrial food processing, the costs of emergency stops caused by wear can compromise the business’s financial health. However, wear and tribocorrosion of stainless steel in media like tomato pastes are poorly addressed in the literature. The aim of this study is to identify the wear mechanisms occurring in the tomato processing industry under real industrial conditions. Currently, there are no published studies specifically addressing material wear in contact with tomato-based paste, highlighting the need for this research. For this analysis, worn specimens obtained after an industrial run of a plunger used in the homogenizer of tomato pastes were selected. In the industrial process, a 316L stainless steel plunger slides over the sleeve, forcing the tomato pulp to pass through an orifice, like an extrusion process. The geometrical change of the cylindrical plunger caused by wear can reduce the pressure in the system, making the system inefficient. The samples were taken from the worn region of a plunger after industrial use, then ultrasonic cleaned. The microstructure of the material in the samples was analyzed by optical microscopy (OM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The morphology and composition of the worn surfaces were analyzed by OM, SEM, and profilometry by confocal microscopy. Scoring marks were identified, probably related to abrasive wear, in addition to plastic deformation, delamination, and tribocorrosion. The identification of the wear mechanisms opens an investigation route. Once the real wear mechanisms are known, future works can find laboratory tribological testing conditions capable of reproducing such mechanisms, enabling the investigation of alternative tribological solutions for the tomato processing industry.</p>