Introduction: Esophageal cancer is the fourth most common cause of cancer death in China. Patients with esophageal cancer are more likely to suffer from malnutrition. The purpose of this study is to assess nu-tritional status of patients with esophageal cancer from multiple perspectives and analyze the risk factors. Methods: A total of 1482 esophageal cancer patients were enrolled in the study. We investigated the Scored Patient Generated Subjective Global Assessment (PG-SGA) scores, NRS-20 02 scores, Karnofsky performance status scores, anthropometric, and laboratory indicators of patients. Unconditional logistic regression anal-ysis was applied to identify the risk factors of nutritional status. Results: PG-SGA ( >4) and NRS-20 02 ( >3) showed the incidence of malnutrition were 76% and 50%, respectively. In the patients with PG-SGA score >4, the proportion of patients who did not receive any nutritional support was 60%. The incidence of mal-nutrition in females was significantly higher than that in males. Besides, abnormality rates of Red blood cell ( P < 0.001), MAC ( P = 0.037), and MAMC ( P < 0.001) in males was significantly higher than that in fe-males, while abnormality rates of TSF ( P < 0.001) was lower than that in females. After adjusted with the other potential risk factors listed, unconditional logistic regression analysis indicated smoking (odds ratio: 2.868, 95% confidence interval: 1.660-4.954), drinking (OR: 1.726, 95% CI: 1.099-2.712), family history (OR: 1.840, 95% CI: 1.132-2.992), radiotherapy or chemotherapy (OR: 1.594, 95% CI: 1.065-2.387), and pathologi-cal stage (OR: 2.263, 95% CI: 1.084-4.726) might be the risk factors of nutritional status, while nutritional support can reduce the risk of malnutrition. Conclusion: Effective nutritional risk assessment methods and nutritional intervention measures can be adopted according to the research data to improve quality of life of esophageal cancer patients. (c) 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.