objective: in this study, productivity and essential oil quality of rose-scented geranium (pelargonium graveolens l' herit. ex aiton.) varieties, namely cimap bio-g-171, cim-pawan and bourbon were assessed and compared in two locations of north india. methods: a field experiment was conducted to evaluate the productivity, while the chemical composition of the essential oils was assessed by gc-fid and gc-ms. result: yields of fresh leaves and essential oil from cimap bio-g-171 were significantly higher (173.64-174.42 q h-1 and 69.93-79.06 l h-1) than those of cim-pawan (158.08-160.56 q h-1 and 55.57-64.46 l h-1) and bourbon (133.34-139.33 q h-1 and 44.19-48.38 l h-1). major constituents of the oils were citronellol (20.9-39.5%), geraniol (10.9-26.5%), linalool (2.9-14.2%), isomenthone (7.4-9.4%), citronellyl formate (5.5-9.1%) and 10-epi--eudesmol (5.2-9.0%). conclusion: the essential oil yields and chemical compositions were substantially influenced by variety and location of growing. the variety cimap bio-g-171 showed improvement up to 58.2-63.4% and 22.6-25.8% in essential oil productivity over the existing prevalent varieties, bourbon and cim-pawan, respectively.