Abstract: Objective To investigate the prevalence of depression among Chinese elderly and to explore the relationship between body mass index (BMI) and depression. Methods Our data were collected from the 2015 China health and retirement longitudinal study (CHARLS). 10 403 elderly participants aged 60 years and older from 450 village-level units and community units of 150 county-level units were selected in this study. Logistic regression was used to explore the relationship between BMI and depression. Results The prevalence of depression among Chinese elderly was 32.7%. Among the elderly men, after controlling the social demographic factors, healthy behavior, activities of daily living and other confounding factors, the overweight group (OR=0.728, 95% CI:0.593-0.893) and the obese group (OR=0.582, 95% CI:0.413-0.821) were associated with depression, when compared with the normal group. However, there was no significant relationship between underweight, overweight, obese and depression among elderly women (all P>0.05). Conclusions BMI is associated with depression only among elderly men in China, but this association did not exist among elderly women.