Abstract: A method was established to determine trace cadmium in geological samples by rapid temperature programming-graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometry. In order to enhance the analytical efficiency, temperature program of graphite furnace atomization was improved by omitting the ashing step, which resulted in shortening the analysis period from 90-100 s to 24 s. The detection limit of the method was 0.011 μg/g for Cd and the recovery was 93.5%-106.0%. The method has been applied to the determination of trace Cd in 1∶200000 geochemical exploration samples and multi-purpose regional geochemical survey samples with satisfactory results.