In this study, the differences of yield, yield components, quality traits and their relationships of Jiangsu japonica varieties were analyzed based on the data collected from the regional new rice varieties tests of Jiangsu in 2013–2015. There were very significant positive correlations between the yield and the plant height, the growth period and the seed setting rate of Jiangsu japonica rice. There were no significant correlations between the appearance quality traits and the number of effective spikes, grains per spike, seed–setting rate and 1 000–grain weight, suggesting that yield increase has little influence on processing quality, appearance quality or eating quality. The correlations between processing quality and appearance quality, cooking and eating quality were not significant; however, there was a prominent contradiction between appearance quality and cooking and eating quality, the chalky rice rate and chalkiness degree were significantly negatively correlated with amylase content (–0.423**and –0.682**) respectively, and significantly positively correlated with gel consistency (0.218** and 0.404**) respectively. The results indicated that there were no serious contradictions between yield and major quality traits of Jiangsu japonica rice varieties; it is feasible to improve rice quality without sacrificing yield, make a balance relationship between appearance quality traits and palatability, and breed new rice varieties of high–quality high–yielding and stable–yielding.