The performance of the photosynthetic apparatus was examined in the third leaves of Zea mays L. seedlings grown at near‐optimal (25 °C) or at suboptimal (15 °C) temperature by measuring chlorophyll (ChI) a fluorescence parameters and oxygen evolution in different temperature and light conditions. In leaf tissue grown at 25 and 15 °C, the quantum yield of PSII electron transport (ψ _PSII ) and the rate of O ₂ evolution decreased with decreasing temperature (from 25 to 4 °C) at a photon flux density of 125 μmol m ⁻² s ⁻¹ . In leaves grown at 25 °C, the decrease of ψ _PSII correlated with a decrease of photochemical ChI fluorescence quenching ( q _p ), whereas in leaves crown at 15 °C q _p was largely insensitive to the temperature decrease. Compared with leaves grown at 25 °C, leaves grown at 15 °C were also able to maintain a higher fraction of oxidized to reduced Q _A (greater q _p ) at high photon flux densities (up to 2000 μmol m ⁻² s ⁻¹ ), particularly when the measurements were performed at high temperature (25 °C). With decreasing temperature and/or increasing light intensity, leaves grown at 15 °C exhibited a substantial quenching of the dark level of fluorescence F ₀ ( q ₀ ) whereas this type of quenching was virtually absent in leaves grown at 25 °C. Furthermore, leaves grown at 15 °C were able to recover faster from photo inhibition of photosynthesis after a photoinhibitory treatment (1200 μmol m ⁻² s ⁻¹ at 25, 15 or 6 °C for 8 h) than leaves grown at 25 °C. The results suggest that, in spite of having a low photosynthetic capacity, Z. mays leaves grown at sub optimal temperature possess efficient mechanisms of energy dissipation which enable them to cope better with photoinhibition than leaves grown at near‐optimal temperature. It is suggested that the resistance of Z. mays leaves grown at 15 °C to photoinhibition is related to the higher content of carotenoids of the xanthophyll cycle (violaxanthin + antheraxanthin + zeaxanthin) measured in these leaves than in leaves grown at 25 °C.