AbstractAt the Erlangen Surgical Clinical Hospital, we have resected 49 liver metastases in 38 patients. The 5‐year survival rate is 20%. One female patient has survived for 17 years. The prognosis is most favorable in solitary metastases, and in cases in which local resections of metastases have proven adequate for the removal of metastases. If primary tumors and liver metastases are removed at the same time, obviously the prognosis is better than in cases of later diagnosis and resection. If the liver is the first filter for disseminated cells from the primary tumor, the survival rates are higher than if the lungs represent the primary filter.Solitary liver metastases must be removed in any case. If the patient has been operated on locally and curatively with extirpation of the primary tumor, solitary liver metastases should be removed at the same operation. Lobectomies are required only in cases in which substantial metastases already are present. Local resection with a 2‐cm margin of normal tissue is adequate.