Objective To summarize the clinical therapeutic efficacy of emergent laparoscopic cholecystectomy （LC） and emergent open cholecystectomy （OC）. Methods One hundred and thirty-three patients with acute cholecystitis from March 2011 to June 2012 in this hospital were randomly divided into emergent LC （ELC） group and emergent OC （EOC） group. The examination and treatment before and after operation were the same. The clinical data before and during operation， postoperative complications， and recovery conditions were observed and compared. Results There was no obvious difference of the clinical data before operation between the ELC group and EOC group （P＞0.05）. Also， there were no significant differences of the operation time， biliary duct injury rate， postoperative bleeding rate， and reoperation rate in two groups （P＞0.05）. The time of postoperative anal exsufflation， time of out-of-bed activity， and postoperative hospital stay in the ELC group were significantly shorter than those in the EOC group （P＜0.05）， the poor incision healing rate in the ELC group was significantly lower than that in the EOC group （P＜0.05）， and the intraoperative blood loss in the ELC group was significantly less than that in the EOC group （P＜0.05）. Conclusions ELC as compared with EOC， are less intraoperative blood loss， less postoperative complications， more rapid recovery， and do not increase operation time. In a hospital with skilled LC technique， ELC is safe and feasible， has obvious advantages of minimal invasion.