Graph neural networks (GNNs) have recently attracted much attention due totheir exceptional performance in a wide range of applications, including hyperspectralimage classification. However, most GNN-based models developed forhyperspectral image classification are shallow-layer models that combine CNNand GNN to improve performance. The use of fewer layers in their GNN models isattributed to the observed degradation in performance as the depth of GNN modelsincreases. This study proposes HyperGCN, an exclusive GNN-based modelwith multiple graph convolutional layers that exploit the rich spectral informationcontained in hyperspectral images and improve classification performance.HyperGCN prevents performance degradation by incorporating over-smoothingresistanttechniques into its architecture. Extensive experiments on widely usedhyperspectral benchmark datasets such as the Indian Pines dataset and thePavia University dataset show that HyperGCN outperforms traditional graphconvolutional neural network models in all performance metrics, including overallaccuracy, average accuracy, class-specific accuracy, and Cohen’s kappa coefficient.HyperGCN also outperformed fusion models that combine the benefits of CNNand GNN when classifying hyperspectral images.