Papillary thyroid cancer is the most common type of thyroid cancer, accounting for about 90% of all thyroid cancers. The majority of patients are women and it is most often seen in young adults. It has a low malignancy and is usually a solitary lesion. Papillary thyroid cancer is predominantly lymph node metastasis, with some cases having enlarged lymph nodes in the neck as the first symptom. Patients with clinically non-palpable lymph nodes have lymph node metastasis in 46%-72% of cases after selective neck dissection pathological findings. Some patients will present with enlarged lymph nodes in the neck and the intrathyroidal swelling may have been present for months or years. Because the intrathyroidal swelling develops slowly and often without specific signs, it can be misdiagnosed as benign and the swelling can be small. In advanced stages, the mass can be significantly enlarged and can be more than 10 cm in diameter. Papillary carcinoma is mainly solid and some of them are cystic. When it invades the trachea or other surrounding organs, the mass will be fixed; when it invades the recurrent laryngeal nerve, it will cause hoarseness; when it compresses the trachea and displaces or invades the trachea, it will cause difficulty in breathing. Lymph node metastasis is mostly to the central region around the trachea, further to the lateral cervical region, and in advanced stage, it may metastasize to the upper mediastinum. Hematogenous metastases are less common and are mostly found in the lung, bone and brain. The determination of the nature of thyroid swelling mainly relies on the typical imaging performance of ultrasound. The most accurate method for further preoperative diagnosis is FNA (fine needle aspiration cytology diagnosis), which should be performed before treatment to clarify the extent of the lesion and the relationship with surrounding organs. The treatment for papillary thyroid cancer is mainly surgery, supplemented by endocrine therapy and radioactive iodine therapy. Because papillary thyroid cancer is a differentiated type of thyroid cancer with low malignancy, it is usually curable.