Hand deboned and mechanically deboned chicken meat were produced from domestic broilers and spent layers. Meat yield, chemical composition, functional characteristics, storage stability and microbiogical properties were investigated. The results obtained were as follows: 1. 35% of carcass freight was recovered primarily as hand deboned chicken meat (HDM) and 45% secondarily as mechanically deboned chicken meat(MDM), total meat yield reaching 80% of carcass weight. 2. Moisture, protein, fat. ash and calcium content of MDM were 65, 12, 20, 1.7 and $0.2{sim}0.4%$, respectively MDM was higher than HDM in fat, ash and calcium, but significantly lower in moisture and protein Total pigment content of MDM was 2.5 times higher than that of HDM, such high content being attributed to the increased inclusion of hemoglobin during the mechanical masceration of carcass in the deboning process. 3. The emulsifying capacity (ES) of MDM per g meat was only 70% that of HDM, but when ES was expressed on unit g of protein basis MDM showed even higher ES than HDM primarily due to the higher proportion of salt soluble protein fraction of MDM. 4. Since the TBA value of MDM increased rapidly after 4 weeks of frozen storage at $-20^{circ}C$, the maximum possible storage period of MDM is estimated to be about 4 weeks. 5. Total microbial counts of MDM was approximately $1.8{ imes}10;cells/g$ showing no great difference from HDM or red meat.