Objective To investigate the causes of blindness and low vision of the people over 50 years old in Binhu Area of Wuxi City. Methods Cluster sampling was used in randomly selected individuals over 50 years old in 28 villages. The oculopathy related to blindness and low vision of the people over 50 years old were analyzed. The vision acuity lt;0.05 was defined as blindness, while 0.05-0.3 was defined as low vision. SPSS 17.0 software was used to analyze the data. Results Totally 6150 individuals were examined. The bilateral blindness and low vision was found in 47 and 84 individuals, unilateral blindness and low vision was found in 201 and 214 individuals. Among 201 unilateral blindness individuals, there were 55 individuals have low vision in the other eye. In the 295 blind eyes, there are 116 eyes (39.32%) with cataract, 31 eyes (10.51%) with high myopia macular degeneration, and 28 (9.49%) eyes with atrophy eyeballs. In the 437 low vision eyes, there are 223 eyes (51.03%) with cataract, 41 (9.38%) eyes with high myopia macular degeneration, and 41 (9.38%) eyes with age-related macular degeneration. Conclusion Cataract is the first cause leading to blindness and low vision, followed by age-related macular degeneration, high myopia macular degeneration and atrophy eyeballs.