Abstract: Camellia sinensis is mainly cultivated for its leaves, and the physiological properties and stress tolerance of leaves directly determine the growth vigor and quality composition of C. sinensis. The object of this study is to explore the physiological changes of different maturity leaves of C. sinensis. Taking 2 tea cultivars as test materials, the malonaldehyde (MDA), proline (Pro), soluble sugars (SS), abscisic acid (ABA), salicylic acid (SA), superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT) of different maturity leaves were monitored, and correlation analysis, principal component analysis were applied to simplify the evaluation index of stress resistance of tea plant. The results were as follows: MDA, SA, SOD and Pro from one bud and two leaves to old leaves showed an increasing trend, their contents in old leaves were significantly higher than those in the other maturity leaves. Only ABA content decreased with the increase of maturity. The SS content first increased and then decreased with the maturity, whose maximum value emerged at the middle leaves (from 3rd to 4th). The correlation analysis indicated that MDA had significantly positive or remarkably and significantly positive correlation with Pro and SA. The ABA had middle and high negative correlation with MDA, SOD, Pro, SA, and CAT. The seven physiological indices of stress resistance of tea plant could be reduced to five, i.e., MDA, ABA, SA, SS and CAT, which could be applied to the evaluation of stress resistance of tea plant, thus to improve the screening efficiency of germplasm materials.