OBJECTIVE The research in recent years has demonstrated that vascular endothelial growth factor-C (VEGF-C) is expressed in certain malignant tumor cells, and up to now VEGF-C is the only growth factor specific for lymphangiogenesis. The relationship between the VEGF-C expression in malignant tumor tissues and lymphatic metastasis is still scarcely reported. This study was designed to compare the VEGF-C expression in human esophageal squamous carcinoma and glioma, and then to analyze the relationship between the VEGF-C expression and tumor lymphatic metastasis. METHODS The expression of VEGF-C antigen was detected with immunohistochemical method in 72 human esophageal squamous carcinomas (29 cases with lymph node metastasis,43 cases without lymph node metastasis) and 23 human gliomas (diagnosed pathologically as astrocytoma in grades I to IV), followed by the further analysis on the relationship between VEGF-C expression and clinicopathological parameters. RESULTS The expression of VEGF-C antigen was not found in any gliomas, while the positive VEGF-C expression rate achieved 38.88%(28/72) in the human squamous carcinoma, with 62.07%(18/29) in the cases with lymph node metastasis, 23.26%(10/43) in the cases without lymph node metastasis, 58.82% (20/34) in the T2 and T3 of invasion depth cases, and 21.05%(8/38)in the T1 of invasion depth cases. CONCLUSIONS The expression of VEGF-C antigen was significantly associated with lymph node metastasis and invasion depth in esophageal squamous carcinoma. VEGF-C may act as a key factor in the facilitation of lymphatic metastasis in esophageal squamous carcinoma.