In this study, we evaluated the expression level of ALDH1A1 in primary HCC surgical sections with two methods, IHC staining and qRT-PCR, investigated the relationship between ALDH1A1 and clinicopathological findings, and examined whether ALDH1A1 deserves to be a cancer stem cell marker in HCC. Here, ALDH1A1 is linked to hepatocellular carcinoma.