Objective To present circumstances of authorized administration system of Chinese health foods, summarize the traits of Chinese health foods, aim to present proposers, consumers and others to know about circumstances of authorized administration of Chinese health foods with some help and references. Methods The rules and regulations on health foods, such as law, rule and act, etc. were compared and summarized. Results The differences between the Rule of Administration Law of Health Foods and the Rule of Authorized Administration Law of Health Foods were listed. The administration rules of health foods were sorted and summarized. According to the procedure of examination, the bases of techno-evaluation in primary parts were presented. According to data of products authorized in years of 2003 - 2005, the characteristics of prescription, materials, and functional elements and so on of Chinese health foods were summarized. Conclusion The survey indicated that the regulations and rules on health foods in China could be relatively integrated. The legislation ideas should be obviously improved.