Depression is one of the most common adolescent mental-health problems presenting to primary care clinics. There is growing concern about the value of depression self-rating scales in epidemiological research and primary care. The present study aimed at assessing the reliability, validity & psychometric properties of an Arabic Version of the Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression [CES-D] Scale. Participants were 1186 secondary school adolescents aged 15- 17 years in Alexandria Governorate. Students were subjected to the Arabic Versions of Child depression Inventory [CDI], CES-D and Coppersmith self-esteem. The results revealed that 9.5 % of students were moderately to severely depressed according to CDI cutoff score. Using the Receiver Operating Characteristic [ROC] curve, a cut-off point of 25 produced the best overall screening efficiency [sensitivity =92%, specificity =90 % & accuracy =0.96]. The internal consistency of the scale was acceptable [Cronbach's a = 0.86). The test-retest reliability was satisfactory [spearman's correlation between 0.61 & 0.95 for individual items and 0.75 for total score). Factor analysis extracted four factors that explained 50.08% of variability namely negative affect/cognitive symptoms, interpersonal difficulties, reduced positive affects and somatic complaints, with an acceptable reliability [Cronbach's a= 0.75, 0.82, 0.74 &0.55 respectively]. Concurrent validity was supported by significant high spearman's correlation between CDI & CES-D scores [rs = 0.83], convergent validity was confirmed by inverse moderate correlation between CES-D scores and Coppersmith self-esteem scale scores [r = 0.69]. The present study concluded that the Arabic Version of CES-D is both a reliable and valid screening tool for depression among Egyptian adolescent population, with very good psychometric properties. Implications for epidemiological research and primary mental health care of adolescents will be discussed.