Barley is one of the most important multipurpose crops in Ethiopia. However, its productivity and quality in Ethiopia is mainly constrained by soil fertility problems, inadequate availability and use of inputs such as fertilizers, lack of high quality and high-yielding varieties and poor agronomic practices. An experiment on malt barley was conducted in Farat District during the main rainy season of 2020/2021. The objective of experiment was to determine the optimum nitrogen fertilizer rate and its appropriate time of application for maximum production and better quality of malt barely varieties. The treatments consisted of three N rates (34.5, 69 and 103.5 kg N ha -1 , three times of N fertilizer applications: T1 (2/3 at sowing + 1/3 at mid- tillering), T2 (1/3 at sowing +2/3 at mid-tillering), T3 (1/3 at sowing +1/3 at mid- tillering + 1/3 at anthesis)and two malt barley varieties (Holker and IBON 174/03), a total of 18 treatments were evaluated in factorial arrangement using Randomized Completely Block Design with three replications. All necessary data were collected properly and subjected to analysis of variance using SAS 9.0 version and mean separation for significant treatments was done by LSD. The result of the study showed that most of the traits studied were significantly affected by the main and interaction effects. Above ground biomass and grain yield were significantly affected by the combined effect of variety with nitrogen rate and N rate with its time of application. The total protein content was significantly influenced by the interaction of variety with rate of nitrogen and variety with time of N application. Generally, the highest grain yield (4.26 t ha -1 ) was obtained when (69 Kg N ha )was applied with two splits 1/3 at sowing + 2/3 at mid-tillering. The protein content recorded on this treatment combination was within the acceptable range for malting purpose. The partial budget analysis showed that the maximum net return ETB 82,627.50 with acceptable MRR (1824.20%) was obtained from this treatment combination. Therefore, application of 69 kg N ha -1 with two splits 1/3 at sowing + 2/3 at mid-tillering is recommended for Farat District and similar agro ecologies. Since the current study was conducted in a single location and only one year, it is better to repeat this experiment on multi-locations and over seasons to come up with reliable recommendation.