Objective To evaluate the clinical effectiveness of laparoscopic and open appendectomy. Methods Literatures relating to randomized controlled trials in English and Chinese on the comparison of clinical effectiveness after laparoscopic and open appendectomy in appendicitis from PubMed，Wiley Online Library，Medline，Embase，Cochrane，CNKI，VIP，CBM databases were extracted，and methodological quality was evaluated by two reviewers independently with designed extraction form. The Cochrane Collaboration’s RevMan 4.2.2 software was used for data analysis. The wound infection，hospitalization time，operation time，hospitalization expenses，and peritoneal abscess were compared between laparoscopic and open appendectomy. Results Eight published reports of eligible studies were extracted. Compared with the open appendectomy， laparoscopic appendectomy had significant differences in lower wound infection rate 〔OR=0.19，95%CI （0.09，0.38），P＜0.000 01〕， longer operation time 〔WMD=3.66，95%CI （0.50，6.82），P=0.02〕，and more hospitalization expenses〔WMD=503.96，95%CI （337.23，670.70），P＜0.000 01〕.But there were no significant differences in hospitalization time〔WMD=-0.11，95%CI （-3.64，3.43），P=0.95〕 and incidence rate of peritoneal abscess 〔OR=1.40，95%CI （0.23，8.64），P=0.71〕 between laparoscopic and open appendectomy. Conclusions The wound infection rate is lower，but the operation time is longer，the hospitalization expenses is more in laparoscopic appendectomy as compared with open appendectomy. There are no statistically significant differences of hospitalization time and incidence rate of abdominal abscess between laparoscopic and open appendectomy.