Salinity is one of the major environmental stresses that leaves meaningful negative effects on physiological, biochemical and dry matter and grain yield attributes of crop plants. Seed priming can be hired for mitigating the negative effects of stresses. A study was conducted to evaluate the effect of salinity on chickpea genotypes and the response of Arman chickpea to seed priming under four levels of NaCl (0, 25, 50 and 75 mM). In one of the experiments six chickpea genotypes ( i.e. Arman, Azad, Hashem, ILC-482, Khorram Abad and Noor Abad) were subjected to the NaCl levels in a 4-replicate completely random design. In another experiment the Arman genotype was subjected to four levels of seed priming (i. e. control, 0.5% NaCl solution for 14 houres, 0.5% KCl solution for 14 houres and 5% Manitol for 24 houres) using a 4-replicate completely random design. In experiment one, salinity led to significant decreases in number of days to flowering, physiological maturity, number of main branches, fertile pods, seeds/pod, dry matter yield, grain yield, harvest index and Ca +2 content. Though, NaCl salt led to significant increases in Na + , K + and Na + /K + of shoot. Genotypes ILC-482 (1.99 gr/plant) and Arman (0.47 gr/plant) produced the greatest and smallest grain yields. The greatest (1 mmole/gr) and smallest (0.58 mmole/gr) means of Na + / K + were detected in genotypes Arman and ILC-482, respectively. Genotype ILC-482 out performed the rest of chickpea genotypes in terms of number of main branches, fertile pods, seeds/pod, K + accumulation, dry matter yield and harvest index, while it needed a greater number of days to maturity. In experiment two, salinity led to significant decreases in days to flowering and physiological maturity, plant height, number of main branches, fertile pods, seeds/pod, grain yield, dry matter yield, and harvest index. 16.78-, 10.80- and 9.10- fold increases in Na + , K + and Na + / K + of chickpea under 75Mm of NaCl were evident compared to under control conditions. While different levels of seed priming did not differ in terms of K + contens, Na + / K + , days to emergence, number of main branches, harvest index and grain yield decreased significantly when chickpea seeds were primed by KCl solution for 14 houres. The greatest and smallest Na + contents were found in the chickpea plants primed with mannitol and KCl- treated seeds led to increase in days to maturity and plant height of chichpea . Key words : salinity, seed priming , chickpea, yield