To investigate the effects of endophytic fungal elicitors on the growth and atractylodin accumulation of cell suspension cultures of Atractylodes lancea.The endophytic fungal elicitors were added to the medium with different concentrations and culture period. Their effects on biomass, atractylodin content and relevant enzyme activities in suspension cultured cells were studied.The cell growth was not affected by elicitors at low concentration and obviously inhibited at high concentration. Inhibition rate reached 46.7% by 100 mg L(-1) elicitor. In addition, six strains from A. lancea, among which Rhizoctonia SP1 activity was higher, had distinctly promoted the accumulation of atractylodin. Atractylodin biosynthesis was notably promoted by 20-60 mg L(-1) Rhizoctonia SP1 elicitor. When 40 mg L(-1) Rhizoctonia SP1 elicitor was added in the medium at the 12 day, the maximum content of atractylodin was 28.06 microg L(-1) at the 21 day with 48.3% higher than that of the control and PPO, POD and CAT activities remarkably increased.Adding the endophytic elicitors to the medium is able to be effective approaches to enhance atractylodin yield in the suspension culture cell of A. lancea.