Abstract: There has not been a particable industrial-original classification of oil shales in China as yet. Just because of this, the rational evaluation of oil-shale resource has been affected. On the basis of the appraisal for foreign classification and the analysical results of the samples obtained from 21 oil-shale producing areas, ash content, tar yield, calorific value and ash constituent are chosen as the parameters of classification. Oil shale is originally classified into sapropel（A）, humics-sapropel（B）, sapropelhumics（c） and liptobiolith（D）. Then, it is divided three groups, stood for by 10,20 and 30, by orginic composition. Further, four varieties, symbolized separately by 1,2,3 and 4, are distinguished from inorganic composition i.e.ash type of silica, silica-alumina, iron or calcite.