ABSTRACT Household dietary diversity opens the opportunity to estimate household food security and it is an effective indicator of various parameters that affect the nutrition of people. This study used a cross-sectional data that covered a sample of 280 households collected from Hurumu District in Oromia IluAbabora zone. The food intake patterns of the participants were recorded by 24 hours recall method. Household dietary diversity score was calculated and categorized as Low HDDS (<3 Food groups), Moderate HDDS (4-5 Food groups) and High HDDS (>6 Food groups). Ordinal logistic regression model (proportional odd model) was used to estimate the effects of different variables on dietary diversity of households. The study showed that 63.9%, 20%, and only 16.1% of the households reported as medium, low and high level of dietary diversity status respectively. Foods made of cereals or starchy staple were consumed by 100% of the families. Legumes were the second in consumption comprising 88.9% of the households. The third is foods such as condiments, coffee or tea comprise 87.9% and vegetables for 56.1% of households. The other food groups which were not commonly consumed include roots and tuber crops comprising 30% and milk 23.2%. Rarely consumed food groups include egg 12.5%, fruit 10%, meat 8.2%, sugar 6.8 and fish was the last with a proportion of 1.4% in consumption. Result from ordinal logistic regression model showed that dependency ratio ,livestock ownership, education level of household head, ownership of coffee land, access to mobile , agro climate of the area and of farm and nonfarm jobs were significant in determining households dietary diversity. The finding shows that there was no significant difference in dietary diversity status between male and female-headed households. There were significant difference in terms of house hold size and in mean monthly income from all livelihood sources; which is significantly greater for male-headed households. Household dietary diversity of the area is moderate dominated by starch staple in both male and female-headed households. Livestock ownership, of farm and none farm jobs; education level of household heads, ownership of coffee land, having mobile phone are key determinants that can positively condition households to attain high dietary diversity and or household food security. Keywords: Ordinal logistic regression model, household dietary diversity, household dietary diversity score, IlluAbabora, Ethiopia.