Abstract: The aim of this study was to find out variability, heritability and genetic advance for some yield and yield related traits in Ethiopian Barley. Thirty six barley landraces and crosses were tested at three locations in Bale highlands of Southeast of Ethiopia in 6x6 simple lattice design with two replications during 2006 Bona (July-December) cropping season. Variances component method was used to estimate variability, broad sense heritability and genetic advance of yield and some yield related characters. Statistically, significant (p<0.01) variation was observed among materials tested for important quantitative traits across locations indicating the presence of variability. In addition, Genotypic Coefficient of Variability (GCV) and Phenotypic Coefficient of Variability (PCV) was relatively higher for grain yield per plot (20.13, 23.27%), number of kernels per spike (18.30, 20.70%) and spike weight (11.80, 15.20%), respectively, across locations. And relatively high heritability was obtained for spike length (0.868) followed by thousand kernel weight (0.856), number of kernels per spike (0.785), grain yield per plot (0.714) across locations showing better condition for effective selection in these characters. This implies the presence of more additive gene effects for potential crop improvement. Beside this, high genetic advance was observed for spike length, number of kernels per spike and thousand-kernel weight. These indicate that there is good scope for crop improvement through selection. This study revealed that greater yield response could be obtained through direct selection scheme in barley landraces and crosses tested. This may be the nature of landraces with better adaptive traits to variable environmental factors which has paramount importance for the local farmers to reduce risk.