In this paper, we investigate whether seasonal adjustment procedures are, at least approximately, linear data transformations. This question is important with respect to many issues including estimation of regression models with seasonally adjusted data. We focus on the X-11 program and first review the features of the program that might be potential sources of nonlinearity. We rely on simulation evidence, involving linear unobserved component ARIMA models, to assess the adequacy of the linear approximation. We define a set of properties for the adequacy of a linear approximation to a seasonal adjustment filter. These properties are examined through statistical tests. Next, we study the effect of X-11 seasonal adjustment on regression statistics assessing the statistical significance of the relationship between economic variables in the same spirit as Sims (1974) and Wallis (1974). These findings are complemented with several empirical examples involving economic data.