This research was conducted at the experimental field of Plant Breeding and Genetics Department, NWFP Agricultural University, Peshawar, during 2001-03, to study combining abilities of important traits in bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) in a 8 x 8 half diallel crosses. The varieties included in this study were; Ghaznavi-98, Fakhre Sarhad, Tatara, Takbeer, SQ-92, SARC- 3, ICP-3 and Dera-98. Mean squares for general combining ability were highly significant for days to heading, flag leaf area, days to maturity, plant height, spike length, grains spike-1, 1000-grain weight and harvest index while tillers plant-1 and yield plant-1 were non-significant. Mean squares due to SCA and reciprocal effect were significant for all the traits studied. Additive gene effects controlled the expression of all the traits under study as evidenced by greater mean squares for general combining ability. The varieties SARC-3, SQ-92 and Takbeer possessed high GCA effects for most of the traits and were thus considered to be good general combiners. High SCA effects for days to heading, flag leaf area, tillers plant-1, days to maturity, plant height, spike length, grains spike-1, 1000-grain weight, harvest index and yield plant-1 were observed for hybrids, GZ x ICP, SQ x ICP, FS x Dera, Tat x SQ, Tat x SARC, Tat x SQ, Tkb x SARC, FS x Dera, SQ x ICP and SQ x Dera, respectively.