A method was developed for the simultaneous determination of 19 phthalate esters (PAEs) at trace level in cosmetics by solid phase extraction (SPE) purification and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) detection. The PAEs were extracted from cosmetic samples by dichloromethane with ultrasonic-assisted technique, purified by an SPE column packed with silica gel and neutral alumina (2: 3, m/m) with the elution of 20 mL of mixed solvent of ethyl acetate-hexane (8: 2, v/v). Qualitative and quantitative analysis were carried out by GC-MS in full scan and selected ion monitoring modes. The retention time of quantitative ions and the abundance ratio of characteristic ions were applied to rapidly and accurately identify each analyte so as to prevent the occurring of possible mistakes from complex matrix intervention. Under optimized conditions, the average recoveries for a shampoo sample spiked with the standards at 0.1, 0.5, 2.0 microg/g were in the range of 72.2% and 110.9%, and the relative standard deviations (RSDs) for the 19 PAEs were less than 10.3% (n = 6) at the spiked level of 0.1 microg/g. The limits of detection (LODs, as 3 times of standard deviation) were between 0.0065 microg/g (for diisopentyl phthalate) and 0.062 microg/g (for diisobutyl phthalate). The method was successfully applied to the determination of the PAEs in 6 types of cosmetics. It is expected to promote the determination of the PAEs in other cosmetics with different matrices.