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Mostly grown in the semi-arid and even arid areas, Algerian wheat cultivars are potential donors of genes for drought resistance traits. We estimated the osmotic adjustment capacity, based on pollen grain expression, in nine Triticum durum and five Triticum aestivum cultivars grown in Algeria and found significant differences among them in the reduction of projected cytoplasm area in pollen grains soaked in 50% PEG solution with added KCl, as compared with the pollen grains soaked in 30% PEG solution. In common wheat Mahon Demias and the durum cultivars Mohamed Ben Bachir and Bousselem, the area of the cytoplasm in stressed pollen grains represented more than 925 of the area in non-stressed pollen grains, while in other cultivars the projected cytoplasm area of pollen grains was reduced by more than 25%. This recommends cultivars Mahon Demias, Mohamed Ben Bachir and Bousselem for use as parents in breeding for improved osmotic adjustment. Cuticular transpiration was measured in five Algerian cultivars and showed a relatively low variability for these trait. The average of the five Algerian cultivars was better than the average of Romanian cultivars and the average of all cultivars from the analyzed international collection. However the best Algerian entry was not superior to the best Romanian cultivar or to the best entry from the international collection. This suggests that the analyzed Algerian cultivars may not be useful for use as parents in breeding for reducing cuticular transpiration.