The correlations between chemical composition and coefficient of standardized ileal digestibility (CSID) of crude protein (CP) and amino acids (AA) were determined in 22 soybean meal (SBM) samples originated from USA (n = 8), Brazil (BRA; n = l) and Argentina (ARG; n = l) in 21-day oíd broilers. Birds were fed a commercial maize-SBM diet from 1 to 17 days of age followed by the experimental diets in which the SBM tested was the only source of protein (205g CP/kg) for three days. Also, in vitro nitrogen (N) digestión study was conducted with these samples using the two-step enzymatic method. The coefficient of apparent ileal digestibility (CAID) of the SBM, independent of the origin, varied from 0.820 to 0.880 for CP, 0.850 to 0.905 for lysine (Lys), 0.859 to 0.907 for methionine (Met) and 0.664 to 0.750 for cysteine (Cys). The corresponding CSID valúes varied from 0.850 to 0.966 for CP, 0.891 to 0.940 for Lys, 0.931 to 0.970 for Met and 0.786 to 0.855 for Cys. The CSID of CP and Lys of the SBM were positively correlated with CP (r = 0.514; P<0.05 and r=0.370; P = 0.09, respectively), KOH solubility (KOH sol.) (r=0.696; P<0.001 and r = 0.619; P < 0.01, respectively), trypsin inhibitor activity (TÍA) (r = 0.541; P < 0.01 and r=0.416; P = 0.05, respectively) and reactive Lys (r=0.563; P<0.01 and r=0.486; P<0.05) valúes, but no relation was observed with neutral detergent fiber and oligosaccharide contení. No relation between the CSID of CP determined in vivo and N digestibility determined in vitro was found. The CSID of most key AA were higher for the USA and the BRA meáis than for the ARG meáis. For Lys, the CSID was 0.921,0.919 and 0.908 (P< 0.05) and for Cys 0.828, 0.833 and 0.800 (P< 0.01) for USA, BRA and ARG meáis, respectively. It is concluded that under the conditions of this experiment, the CSID of CP and Lys increased with CP content, KOH sol., TÍA and reactive Lys valúes of the SBM. The CSID of most limiting AA, including Lys and Cys, were higher for USA and BRA meáis than for ARG meáis.