For patients with early and mid-stage esophageal cancer, surgery is the main treatment tool. Traditional surgery requires a single or combined incision of 25cm in the chest, 15cm in the abdomen and 6cm in the neck, which results in large tissue trauma and bleeding, and has a high incidence of postoperative laryngeal nerve injury, reflux esophagitis, anastomotic fistula, cardiopulmonary complications, etc. Patients suffer from great physical and mental pain. With the rapid development of modern minimally invasive surgery, esophageal cancer treatment has entered the era of minimally invasive surgery. Since 1998, our department has been carrying out minimally invasive surgery for esophageal cancer and has performed hundreds of thoracoscopic minimally invasive esophageal cancer resections. Using thoracoscopy or thoracoscopy combined with laparoscopy to treat esophageal cancer, only a few small incisions of 1 to 2 cm in the chest and abdomen are needed to complete the operation. The whole operation can be completed within 3 to 4 hours, which is comparable to or even shorter than traditional open surgery. By preparing the tubular stomach, the incidence of reflux esophagitis and anastomotic fistula can be significantly reduced, and the compression on the heart and lungs is also significantly reduced. Advantages of minimally invasive thoracoscopic complete esophagectomy for esophageal cancer: 1) Less trauma, less bleeding, less pain, less physiological disturbance, and significantly reduced complication rate. 2)Small surgical scar, fast postoperative recovery, short hospitalization time and low psychological impact. 3)Small impact on postoperative pulmonary function, so that some patients with poor pulmonary function and general condition can also tolerate the surgery. 4)The thoroughness of resection and lymph node dissection for early and middle stage esophageal cancer and postoperative survival rate are not significantly different from those of traditional open-heart surgery.