Gallium nitride (GaN) doped with germanium at a level of 10²⁰ cm⁻³ is proposed as a viable material for cladding layers in blue- and green-emitting laser diodes. Spectral reflectometry and ellipsometry are used to provide evidence of a reduced index of refraction in such layers. The refractive-index contrast to undoped GaN is about 0.990, which is comparable to undoped aluminium gallium nitride (AlGaN) with an aluminium composition of 6%. Germanium-doped GaN layers are lattice-matched to native GaN substrates; therefore, they introduce no strain, cracks, and wafer bowing. Their use, in place of strained AlGaN layers, will enable significant improvements to the production process yield.