The initial attachment of aerobic spore forming bacteria to the surfaces of dairy processing equipment leads to biofilm formation and biofouling. Although spore formers may vary in attachment, various surface modifications are being studied to develop a surface that is least vulnerable to attachment. The aim of this study was to compare the extent of adhesion of spores and vegetative cells of high-heat-resistant spore formers (HHRS) such as B. sporothermodurans, and G. stearothermophilus, and thermo-tolerant species B. licheniformis, and, on both native and modified stainless steel surfaces. Influence of various contact surface and cell surface properties including surface energy, surface hydrophobicity, cell surface hydrophobicity, and zeta-potential on the adhesion tendency of bacteria were compared. The ability of the vegetative cells and spores of different aerobic spore former to attach to native and modified (Ni-P-PTFE) stainless steel surfaces was determined by allowing the interaction between the contact surface, and spores or vegetative cells for an hour at ambient temperature. Hexadecane assay was employed to determine the hydrophobicity of vegetative cells and spores of aerobic spore-forming bacteria, while the surface charge (expressed as zeta potential) was determined using Zeta sizer Nano series instrument. The results indicated higher adhesion tendency of spores over vegetative cells of aerobic spore forming bacteria. On comparing the sporeformers, B. sporothermodurans demonstrated greatest adhesion tendency followed by G. stearothermophilus and B. licheniformis, respectively. As the vegetative cells and spores of B. sporothermodurans and G. stearothermophilus demonstrated significantly greater attachment as compared with B. licheniformis thus it can be interpreted that HHRS show great attachment tendency as compared with thermo-tolerant spore formers. The tendency to adhere varied with the variations in cell surface properties as it decreased with lower cell surface hydrophobicity and higher cell surface charge. On the other hand, modifying the contact surface properties caused the attachment tendency to decrease with the lowering surface energy and increasing surface hydrophobicity.