Two field experiments were carried out during the two winter seasons of 2015 and 2016 under clay loamy soil conditions using surface improving irrigation system at the Experimental Station, Faculty of Agriculture, Mansoura University, Dakahlia governorate, Egypt. to study vegetative growth and yield of cabbage (cv. o.s. cross) influenced by irrigation water deficit treatments in three levels include without stress as control (full irrigation), moderate and severe stresses (75 % and 50 % from the control, respectively) and foliar application with some antioxidants consisted of (without exogenous antioxidant, 0.3 g /l ascorbic acid, 0.1 g/l chitosan and 4.0 g/l glycine betaine) and their interactions. The results showed that increasing of irrigation water deficit led to significant decreases of vegetative growth characters (i.e. Plant height, foliage weight, leaves fresh weight, number of leaves, leaves area), Chemical composition of outer leaves (chlorophyll a, chlorophyll b, carotenoids, N, P and K), Heads yield and its physical and chemical qualities (head weight, edible head weight, edible head diameter, edible head compactness rate, Vit. C, TSS and total heads yield /fed.) and leaf relative water content. On contrast, edible head dry matter, electrolyte Leakage and water use efficiency percentage were increased. As for the impact of foliar application of antioxidant, results exhibited that, the previous parameters were increased compared to the control (without antioxidant) except electrolyte leakage. Chitosan at 0.1 g/l followed by 0.3 g /l ascorbic acid were recorded the highest values of most effective mentioned parameters. The interaction between irrigation water deficit and foliar application with some antioxidants showed that the combination of full irrigation and 0.1 g/l chitosan gave the highest values of most effective previous parameters. Also, insignificant differences were noticed between full irrigation or moderate stress treatments with antioxidant for most effective mentioned parameters.