Organic carbon normalized sorption coefficient of phenanthrene in soils was determined in a batch experiment. The influence of the presence of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) on sorption coefficient was also investigated. The results demonstrated that, the DOC dissolved from the soil would enhance the water solubility of phenanthrene and change the sorption behavior of phenanthrene between soil and water, consequently leading to an underestimation of sorption coefficient. When the binding coefficient of DOC and phenanthrene (K(doc)) from the literatures was adopted for correction of measured data, a better estimation of sorption coefficient could be achieved. In this study, lgK(oc) and lgK(Foc) were 4.35 and 7.01, respectively. Comparison between the uncorrected/corrected lgK(oc) and the literature data could partially reflect the deviation caused by the influence from various concentrations of DOC may occur in many sorption studies in water-soil system. It was significant to compare the sorption coefficient derived from different studies considering this influence.