The nucleation and initial stage of GaN growth on sapphire was investigated by atomic force microscopy, X-ray diffraction and photoluminescence. A 15 to 30 nm thick GaN buffer layer deposited at proper conditions was extremely smooth and nearly amorphous. Proper post deposition annealing resulted in the buffer crystallized. The buffer layer deposition temperature, thickness and annealing time and temperature must be coordinated. Low deposition temperature and/or insufficient annealing of the buffer results in a GaN wafer which has fine spiking surface morphology with an RMS of 3.4 nm for 1.4 μm wafer, strong yellow luminescence and wide xray rocking curve FWHM. High deposition temperature, longer crystallization time, and a low growth rate results in a wafer which exhibits strong band edge luminescence without noticeable yellow luminescence, and a narrow (002) diffraction rocking curve. However, the surface morphology exhibits well developed hexagonal feature with RMS roughness of 14.3 nm for a 570 nm thick layer. X-ray rocking curve analysis revealed buffer crystallization, domain coalescence and alignment process. The FWHM of the ω–scan of GaN (101) diffraction was 1700–2000 arc seconds for 200–1400 nm wafers which indicates that the twist of the domains is not changing much with the growth.