A comparison of the photoluminescence of Er‐doped hydrogenated amorphous silicon and crystalline silicona‐Si:H(Er) andc‐Si(Er), is presented. It is shown thata‐Si:H(Er) exhibits efficient room‐temperature photoluminescence at 1.537 &mgr;m which is as strong as the emission from optimizedc‐Si(Er) at 2 K. Most remarkably, there is practically no temperature quenching of the emission intensity in the range 2–300 K. The experiments suggest that the lifetime connected with the Er‐induced emission is considerably shorter ina‐Si:H(Er) than inc‐Si(Er) which may be responsible for the different dependences of the photoluminescence intensity on the temperature, chopping frequency, and excitation power. ©1995 American Institute of Physics.