Debt is an effective mechanism to mitigate agency costs in relieving manager-shareholder conflicts. Similarly, a choice over maturity of debt allows the firm to discipline entrenched managers. We show cross-country evidence that national culture along with corporate governance factor influences the lender’s (or the borrower’s) choice over the firm’s debt maturity. Using Hofestede’s frameworks (1980, 1991), uncertainty avoidance index (UAI), masculinity (MAS), and long-term orientation (LTO) indices are negatively related to overall debt maturity in country. This implies that the risk-averse lenders offer (or, borrowing firms use) short-term maturity debt when surrounding economic environment becomes more uncertain and ambiguous. This is consistent with literatures that national cultural tendency play a critical role in determining financing decision in the presence of uncertainty and ambiguity. We argue that national culture is one of the last factors to the puzzle of disparity of debt maturities across countries. The relative effect of national culture and corporate governance on firms’ debt maturity selection depends on whether a country’s financial system is bank-based economy (e.g., Japan and Germany) or market-based economy (e.g., U.S. and U.K.).