<p>Taro (<i>Colocasia esculenta</i> (L.) Schott) and tannia (<i>Xanthosoma sagittifolium</i> (L.) Schott) are two popular edible aroids often cultivated as clonal mixtures on smallholder farms in Nigeria. In spite of their nutritional and industrial potentials, commercial production is seriously affected by many abiotic and biotic constraints including limited genetic information on the available germplasm, which reduces their utilization. In this study, 20 taro and 30 tannia accessions were evaluated using agro-morphological and nutritional profiling as a basis to explore the spectrum of divergence that would support selection of high-value genetic resources in the two crops. Based on eight standardized quantitative descriptors, analysis of variance demonstrated significant variations (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.05) with those showing discrimination appraised from factor analysis accounting for 82.41% and 78.01% of the diversity in taro and tannia, respectively. In the resulting dendrograms derived from multivariate analyses of the traits, both taro and tannia produced three distinct clusters from which six top ranking cultivars with superior qualities were identified and selected for commercial cultivation and breeding purposes. Nutritional characterization of representative accessions of the crops also revealed differences in proximate, mineral, phytochemical and anti-nutrient compositions, with taro having higher levels of carbohydrate, calcium and anti-nutritional factors while the tannia accessions had higher contents of protein, crude fibre and potassium. Collectively, these findings demonstrate that extensive agronomic traits which discriminate the taro from tannia cultivars&#xa0;varieties are available within the existing germplasm in Nigeria. This study equally highlights the untapped potentials of both crops as rich deposits of high nutritional value, which can be utilized for addressing food security concerns and good nutrition in the country.</p>