Objective To discuss the clinical and pathological characteristics, treatment results and prognosis of primary parotid malignant lymphoma. Methods Pathological subtypes, clinical stages and treatment of the 24 patients with primary parotid malignant lymphoma were retrospectively analysed. Kaplan-Meier method was used in the survival analysis and Log-Rank method was used in the statistic study. Results The 5-year progression free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were 79.2 % and 83.3 %, respectively. The 5-year PFS and OS were 89.5 % and 94.7 % for 19 patients with low-grade malignant lymphoma (including MALTL and Ⅰ/Ⅱ grade FL). The differences of the 5-year PFS and OS of 9 patients received chemotherapy and of 10 patients with on chemotherapy had no statistical significance. Conclusion The incidence of primary parotid malignant lymphoma is low, at earlier clinical stage, and most of its pathological subtype were B-cell low-grade malignant non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Surgery and/or radiotherapy should be the first choice for patients with early stage low-grade malignant lymphoma, whereas combined modality therapy was probably the best choice for patients with DLBCL.