Crystal orientation and residual stress development in AIN films on borosilicate glass (the thermal expansion coefficient of which is nearly equal to that of AlN) substrate were investigated by atomic force microscopy (AFM) observation and X-ray diffraction method. The AlN films were prepared by a planar magnetron sputtering system with two opposite targets under the condition of constant nitrogen gas pressure, constant substrate temperature, various deposition time and various external magnetic field (EM) between 63 and 128 gauss. We obtain the following results: (1) the size of crystal grains was large and the value of FWHM of 00.2 diffraction line was small at large EM; (2) the c-axis orientation was good for all films; (3) the large tensile residual stresses were obtained at large EM and decreased with decreasing the EM because of ion peening. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.