Abstract: The aquatic environment of marine organisms directly affects the dietary health of residents in coastal areas. As a typical coastal city in the Northeast China, Dalian is adjacent to Bohai Sea and Yellow Sea, and its water-quality safety has been widely concerned. In order to understand the pollution status of phthalates (PAEs) in the surface seawater of Dalian city, its concentration level and distribution characteristics of six PAEs in the seawater were studied by liquid-liquid extraction, column purification coupled with gas chromatography/mass spectrometry. The study reports a range of 86.40 to 7683 ng/L for the total concentration of six PAEs (Σ₆PAEs) in surface seawater. Dibutyl phthalate (DBP) and diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP) are the major components, with average contribution rates of 67.0% and 30.6%, respectively, whereas benzyl butyl phthalate (BBP) and di-n-octyl phthalate (DnOP) were not detected at all. In comparison with the data previously reported, the overall PAEs pollution level in Dalian coastal waters is relatively low, except for some individual samples. It is speculated that sewage discharge and landfill leachate may be the major sources of PAEs pollution. The ecological risk assessment results indicated that the risk posed by diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP) to the aquatic ecosystem under study was higher than that of other assessed contaminants.