Abstract The leaf oils of Psidium guajava and Psidium catlleyanum collected in French Polynesia have been examined for the first time in Tahiti by GC and combined GC/MS. The leaf oil of P. guajava contained a mixture of sesquiterpene hydrocarbons (54.9%) and oxygenated sesquiterpenes (20.9%) with β-caryophyllene (18.3%) as the principal sesquiterpene hydrocarbon and selin-11-en-4a-ol (6.9%), α-cadinol (3.6%), (E)-nerolidol (3.2%) as the main oxygenated sesquiterpenes. Psidium cattleyanum produced oil that was much richer in sesquiterpene hydrocarbons (48.8%) and monoterpene hydrocarbons (10.1%). The main sesquiterpenes present in the oil were β-caryophyllene (31.5%) and α-humulene (4.4%). The two oils also contained a small amount of aromatic compounds, benzaldehyde (2.4%) in P. guajava oil, and the two isomers (E)-methyl isoeugenol (0.6%) and (Z)-methyl-isoeugenol (0.1%) in P. cattleyanum oil.