The objective of the research is to develop a quantitative method by ultra high-performance liquid chromatography/ quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry （UHPLC/Q-TOF MS） for the analysis of seven major steroidal saponins （timosaponin N, timosaponin El, timosaponin BII, timosaponin B, anemarrhenasaponin I, anemarrhenasaponin A2, and timosaponin AIII） in Anemarrhena asphodeloides Bge. The complete separation of these seven steroidal saponins was achieved within 18 min with an ACQUITY UPLC HSS T3 column using an acetonitrile-water （contain 0.1% formic acid） gradient system. The limits of quantitation （LOQ）, 0.18-0.75 ng/pL for seven steroidal saponins, were determined experimentally. The limits of detection （LOD） were found to be 0.05-0.22 ng/μL for these saponins. The correlation coefficients （r2） for calibration curves varied from 0.9902 to 0.9979. This method showed good repeatability for the quantification of these saponins in rhizomes ofA. asphodeloides, with intra-day and inter-day variations of less than 5.0% for seven steroidal saponins. The recoveries of seven steroidal saponins were from 97.13% to 101.98%. The validated method was successfully applied to quantifying seven steroidal saponins in various sources ofA. asphodeloides （different collecting places or processing methods） and Zhimu concentrate-granules （ZMCG）.
