The red pine seed coat contains bioactive components such as polyphenols and flavonoids, and the roasting procedure for processing the pine seed will affect the bioactive contents and antioxidant activity in pine nut seed coat. In this study, both shelled and in-shell pine seed were roasted at 130 ℃ for 10, 20, 30, and 40 min, before the total phenolic content, total flavonoid content, colour change, and antioxidant activity of the seed coat were determined The results showed that the contents of total polyphenols and total flavonoids after roasting were both lowered. The antioxidant ability of the coat of the shelled seeds was higher than that for the in-shell ones. The DPPH scavenging capacity of the shelled seed coat reached the highest after 20-min roasting, with an IC50 of 0.16 mg/mL (which was lower than that for the unroasted ones, 0.17 mg/mL). The hydroxyl free radical scavenging capacity of the shelled roasted seed coat reached the highest after 20 min, with an IC50 of 0.10 mg/mL (which was lower than that for the non-roasted ones, 0.14 mg/mL). The L* value, a value and b value all decreased with the roasting time. The total polyphenol content and total flavonoid content were positively correlated with the DPPH scavenging capacity and hydroxyl radical scavenging capacity, with the correlation coefficients as 0.799 and 0.648, respectively. The peak absorption for the seed coat extract occurred between 274 and 279 nm. Thus, roasting influences the bioactive contents, antioxidant activity and color of the pine seed coat.