Linear and heavy alkyl benzene (HAB) were sulfonated with fuming sulfuric acid (oleum) and the sulfonated products were esterified with tri and poly ethanolamine (d ¼ 4 and 6). The prepared three esters from each series were quaternized with n-butyl bromide. The resulted six quaternized ester of linear and HAB sulfonate were named as (L1Q, L2Q, L3Q, H1Q, H2Q, and H3Q). The surface and thermodynamic properties of these compounds have been investigated. From the data obtained, it was found that surface tension and surface active properties for the HAB derivatives were better than which obtained from linear alkyl benzene (LAB) derivatives. From the results obtained from the surface activity, the best performance compound from each group was selected to study the corrosion inhibition efficiency of them relative to the surface activity. The obtained results show that the LAB derivative L3Q exhibited inhibition efficiency (93.1%) at 1000 ppm but H3Q exhibited (97%) at 600 ppm. The diversity of the resulted data obtained was discussed in the light of chemical structure of the alkyl benzene sulfonate.