Objective To evaluate the values of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in the diagnosis of acetabular labral tears (ALT) by meta-analysis. Methods The studies concerning the diagnosis of ALT tears by using MRI from January 1990 to October 2016 were searched in the databases such as CBM, VIP, WanFang Data, CNKI, PubMed, EMbase, The Cochrane Library and Web of Science. Two reviewers independently screened literature, extracted data, and assessed the risk of bias of included studies by using the QUADAS-2 tool. Then, meta-analysis was performed by using Stata 12.0 software. The pooled sensitivity, specificity, positive likelihood ratio (+LR), negative likelihood ratio (–LR) and the diagnostic odds ratio (DOR) were calculated, and the summary receiver operating characteristic curve (SROC) was drawn and the area under the carve was calculated. Results A total of 25 studies from 21 articles were included, involving 1 123 hips from 1 099 patients. The results of meta-analysis showed that, the pooled Sen, Spe, +LR, –LR, DOR and area under SROC curve of MRI for diagnosing ALT were 0.66 (95% CI 0.38 to 0.86), 0.72 (95% CI 0.47 to 0.89), 2.37 (95% CI 1.18 to 4.67), 0.48 (95% CI 0.25 to 0.92), 4.97 (95% CI 1.60 to 15.47), 0.75 (95% CI 0.71 to 0.79). The pooled Sen, Spe, +LR, –LR, DOR and area under SROC curve of MRA for diagnosing ALT were 0.86 (95% CI 0.80 to 0.90), 0.71 (95% CI 0.55 to 0.83), 2.91 (95% CI 1.77 to 4.80), 0.20 (95% CI 0.13 to 0.32), 14.44 (95% CI 5.80 to 35.95), 0.87 (95% CI 0.84 to 0.90), respectively. Conclusion MRI is efficiency diagnostic method for acetabular labral tears.