In this study, rice harvesting systems suitable to Korean situations and the optimum timing of these systems were determined, respectively, based on experimentally determined factors such as filed yield and the milling quantity and quality measured at various levels of the grain moisture content at harvest. Rice varieties used for the experiment were the AKIBARE (Japonica-type) and the SUWEON 251 (high yielding TONGIL sister-line variety), The harvesting systems studied by the experimental work of this study were traditional system with both the wet material and dry-material threshing system by use of binder with both the dry-material and wet-material threshings, and system by use of combine. Grain samples were taken from final products of the paddy rice harvested from the experiment a fields for each system to measure the recovery rates of the milled rice. The results may be summarized as follows; 1. The milling recovery rate of the AKIBARE variety had highest value within the range of the grain moisture at harvest, showing from 21 to 26 percent. The head-rice recovery for the same variety was a little greater in the wet-material threshing than in the dry-material threshing , higher values of which , were 20 to 25 percent , seen within the range of grain moisture at harvest regardless of the harvesting systems tested. 2. The milling recovery of the SUWEON 251 , when tested for different harvesting systems and harvesting grain moisture, did not show a statistically significant different. In contrast , head-rice recovery for the systems operated by the wet-material threshing was much greater than that by the -material threshing. The difference of the recoveries between these systems range from 2.6 to 4.7 percent. 3. An assessment of the optimum period of -harvest timing for each of the harveulcornersting systems tested were made bJ.sed on (a) the maximum total milled-rise yield and (b) the percentage reduction in the total milled-rice yield due to untimely harvest operations. The optimum period determined are: 23-19% for the ATD, AC, STD, SBW, STW systems, 25-21% for the ATW ani ABW systems, and 27-18% for the ABD, SBD, and SC systems, respectively.