The inhibition effects of photodynamic therapy (PDT) with deuteporfin on tumor proliferation were investigated. Three hours after incubation with deuteporfin, tumor cells were irradiated with 627.8 nm laser (power d.: 20 mW/cm2) for 300 s. The inhibitory effect of deuteporfin-PDT on the proliferation of KB, HCT-116, MKN-45, HELA, Eca-109, and T-24 were measured with sulforhodamine B (SRB) method, resp. Nude mice with human tumor were given laser irradiation (power d.: 120 mW/cm2, duration: 30 min) 1 h after i.v. injection of deuteporfin, and the inhibitory effect of deuteporfin-PDT on tumor proliferation was detected with human tumor nude mice xenografts as models in vivo study. The cytotoxicity IC50 values of deuteporfin-PDT were between 0.14 μM and 0.20 μM on six human solid tumor cell lines. Without laser irradiation, deuteporfin had no inhibitory effect on the proliferation of human solid tumor cell lines. Deuteporfin-PDT had significant inhibitory effect on tumor proliferation of human squamous (KB), gastroadenocarcinoma (MKN-28), and colon adenocarcinoma (HCT-116) xenograft models. The inhibitory effect was dose-dependent. The relative tumor proliferation rates of 10 mg/kg deuteporfin-PDT group were 13.8%, 11.7% and 14.2% 24 days after the treatment, resp. Deuteporfin-PDT had significant proliferation inhibitory effect on solid tumors of different tissue sources.