Abstract: To investigate the quality changes of French fries during processing, potato cultivars ‘Atlantic’ and ‘McCain’ were used as the research materials. The effect of cutting, blanching, freezing and frying processing on color, starch, reducing sugar, total phenol, antioxidant ability, water status and textural characteristics of French fries was studied. The results showed that freezing after blanching significantly (P<0.05) reduced the L^*, a^*and b^* values of French fries. Compared with French fries after fresh-cut process, freezing ‘Atlantic’ French fries after blanching reduced the L^* value by 4.24%. Direct freezing and freezing after blanching treatments had no significant (P>0.05) effect on the starch content of ‘Atlantic’ and ‘McCain’ French fries, but freezing after blanching significantly (P<0.05) reduced the reducing sugar content of ‘McCain’ French fries. The reducing sugar content of ‘McCain’ French fries in freezing group after blanching was 28.88% lower than that of fresh-cut fried group. Furthermore, frying could significantly (P<0.05) increase the total phenol content and antioxidant capacity of French fries. As for the texture characteristics and water status, freezing after blanching, direct freezing and frying all reduced the hardness and crispness of French fries. Freezing treatment after blanching led to an earlier T₂₁ migration time, while frying significantly (P<0.05) increased the proportion of bound water and immobile water. Correlation analysis indicated that the correlation among reducing sugar, starch and total phenol increased after frying, but it was affected by the cultivar and processing condition. This study provides a reference for an in-depth exploration of the effect of processing on potato quality.