Abstract The electron transfer from cyclic organogermanium compounds to photo-excited C60 in benzonitrile solution has been investigated by the 532 nm-laser flash photolysis with observation of the transient absorption bands in the near-IR region. The transient absorption band of the C60 triplet state (TC60*) appeared at 730 nm immediately after nanosecond laser exposure. With the decay of TC60*, the absorption bands of the radical anion of C60 appeared at 1070 nm, showing that the electron transfer takes place from organogermanium compounds to TC60*. The efficiencies and rates of the electron-transfer reactions vary with ring size of the germanium compounds.