The relationship between structural and low-temperature transport properties is explored for InxAl1-xAs/InxGa1-xAs metamorphic quantum wells with x > 0.7 grown on GaAs by molecular beam epitaxy. Different step-graded buffer layers are used to gradually adapt the in-plane lattice parameter from the GaAs towards the InGaAs value. We show that using buffer layers with a suitable maximum In content the residual compressive strain in the quantum well region can be strongly reduced. Samples with virtually no residual strain in the quantum well region show a low-temperature electron mobility up to 29 m(2)/V s while for samples with higher residual compressive strain the low-temperature mobility is reduced. Furthermore, for samples with buffers inducing a tensile strain in the quantum well region, deep grooves are observed on the surface, and in correspondence we notice a strong deterioration of the low-temperature transport properties. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.