Abstract: The reasonable population structure is the basis of rice yield, basic seedling is an important means to regulate the population structure of rice. The purpose of this paper was to research the impact of different basic seedling on japonica rice variety ‘Nanjing 51’ yield to give theoretical support for popularization and application of ‘Nanjing 51’in large area. In the condition of high yield cultivation, the effects of different basic seedlings per hole on the yield and yield components were studied with rice varieties ‘Nanjing 51’. The results showed that the actual production of ‘Nanjing 51’ was the highest when planted four seedlings each hole under the same plant and row spacing 13.3 cm×25 cm. With the increase of the seedlings number per hole, the actual production gradually increased except five seedlings each hole. With the increase of the number of seedlings per hole, the effective panicles per unit area and seed setting rate increased gradually while grain number per panicle reduced with no differences in 1000-grain weight. Regression and path analysis of yield components and yield indicated that raising the yield of ‘Nanjing 51’ relied mainly on the increasing of grain number per panicle.