【Objective】To explore the effect of growing period on upper leaf of tobacco in the center of Henan province.【Method】 With Zhongyan 100 as the experimental material, two experimental designs which included transplanting periods and maturity of leaves, were applied in 2012.【Result and conclusion】The effects of transplanting time and maturity on the chlorophyll and carotenoid content were significant, the chlorophyll content with the same maturity had a slight difference by postponing tobacco transplanting period, but carotenoid presented the tendency that rise firstly, then drop; with the increase of maturity of tobacco leaves, the contents of chlorophyll and carotenoid declined. The contents of degradation product in neophytadiene and carotenoid showed May 6^th >May 15^th >April 27^th episode trend; the performance of content increased first and reduced then with the maturity. Upper leaf quality which is transplanted on May 15^th and picked postponement 5 days than usual,is the best.