Information about changes associated with advances in crop breeding is essential for understanding yield-limiting factors and developing new strategies for future breeding programs. Thus, sixteen malt barley varieties released in Ethiopia between 1979 and 2016 were tested in the 2019 main cropping season at Debre Tabor research site using Randomized complete design with three replications. The objective was to estimate the genetic gain in grain yield and related traits of malt barley varieties. The analysis of variance revealed a significant difference among varieties for all traits. The overall mean increase in grain yield over the oldest variety was 522.55 kg ha-1(20.27%). The estimated annual and relative genetic gains were 15.16 kg ha-1 year -1 and 0.59 % year-1 implying that improvement for grain yield occurred at a low rate over the past 37 years. Stepwise regression analysis depicted that biomass yield and harvest index contributed 97.66 % of the variation in grain yield. Similarly, the progress in most important yield related traits was not consistent and non-significant whereas plant height and phonological traits showed a negative trend with a year of release. Therefore, such gaps need attention in future breeding efforts. Keywords: biomass, correlation, genetic progress, grain yield, regression