inflorescence of coriandrum sativum collected from five locations of north india was hydrodistilled and analysed by gc and gc-ms to assess their chemical diversity. the gc and gc-ms analysis revealed the presence of 30 compounds representing 92.9-98.5% of the total oils. the highest concentration of linalool (62.1%) was found in the essential oil from haldwani. linalool (32.7%), citronellol (22.9%) and caryophyllene oxide (13.5%) were the principal constituents of moradabad oil. citronellol (22.87%), caryophyllene oxide (22.6%) and cis-4-decenal (11.9%) were the major essential oil constituents of the oil collected from didihat while, linalool (19.1%), (2e)-dodecenal (28.7%), (2e)-decen-1-ol (11.8%) and caryophyllene oxide (11.7%) were the dominant constituents in the essential oil of plant collected from pithoragarh. the investigations based on chemical diversity of the oils provide an opportunity to commercially exploit this diversity based on the requirements of the fragrance, flavour and pharmaceutical industries.