BACKGROUND This study describes a simple and stable cervical heterotopic kidney transplantation method in rats that uses artery sleeve anastomosis, vein cuff anastomosis and preserving-bag techniques. METHODS The donor graft, consisting of kidney, renal vein (RV), renal artery (RA) and a ureterocystic flap, was removed en bloc and perfused in situ. The donor RA was end-to-end anastomosed to the recipient left common carotid artery (CCA) using a sleeve anastomosis, and the donor RV was connected to the recipient right external jugular vein (EJV) using a cuff technique. During the vascular anastomosis, the kidney graft was placed in a lactated Ringer's solution ice-water preserving bag. The donor bladder patch was exteriorized to form cervical cutaneous stoma. RESULTS A total of 104 heterotopic renal transplantations were performed, which included pre-experimental (62 operations) and experimental stages (42 operations). The success rates of the two stages were 80.6% and 95.2%, respectively. The time for surgery was 40 +/- 6 min, the average time for donor surgery was 20 +/- 5 min, the preparation time for the graft was 8 +/- 2 min, the operative time for the recipient was 18 +/- 3 min that included the time for the arterial anastomosis (5 +/- 2 min) and venous anastomosis (2 +/- 1 min), the cold ischaemic time of the graft was 15 +/- 3 min and the warm ischaemic time of the graft was 2 +/- 1 min. CONCLUSIONS We developed an easy and reliable model of cervical heterotopic kidney transplantation that may provide a useful tool for investigating kidney transplantation rejection and retransplantation pathology.