We investigated the structural, substructural and electrical properties of ZnS/CdTe and ZnTe/CdTe heterostructures obtained by the close-spaced vacuum sublimation. It was found that the structural properties of CdTe and ZnTe thin films deposited on ZnS or CdTe sublayers are better than those of the films obtained on glass substrate at the same growth conditions. XRD-analysis has shown that ZnxCd1-xTe (x = 0.21-0.30) solid solutions having the cubic phase were formed near the films' interfaces. Furthermore, the saturation current, the ideality factor and the value of the potential barrier height were determined by the analysis of dark current-voltage characteristics. This makes it possible to establish optimal growth conditions of ZnS/CdTe heterojunctions. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.