An effective method was established for the determination of eight ethylene glycol ethers in cosmetics by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry(GC-MS).Samples were ultrasonically extracted with methanol.The extracts were filtered,and analyzed by GC-MS.The quantitation was carried out by the external standard method.The eight target compounds were baseline separated under optimized chromatographic conditions.Good linearities were obtained in respective linear ranges,with correlation coefficients all larger than 0999.The mean recoveries at three spiked levels ranged from 822% to 1130% with relative standard deviations(RSDs) of 060%-85%.The limits of detection(LODs) were in the range of 010-100 mg/kg and the limits of quantitation(LOQs) were 025- 200 mg/kg.The method is simple,accurate,reliable and reproducible,and could be applied in the determination of ethylene glycol ethers in cosmetics.