The objective of this study was to determine whether malic acid could promote the accumulation of vaccenic acid in the rumen. The control diet was composed of a 65:35 ratio of forage to concentrate with 1% (dry matter basis) added fractionated fish oil (rich in docosahexaenoic acid), and treatment diets consisted of the control diet with added malic acid to achieve final concentrations of 10 mM (treatment 1) and 20 mM (treatment 2), respectively. The experiment was conducted with rumen-simulation equipment (Rusitec) consisting of 9 fermenters. Each treatment included 3 fermenters as replicates. After 7 d of incubation, concentrations of vaccenic acid from treatment 1 (4.38% fatty acids) and treatment 2 (4.46% fatty acids) were similar to that of the control treatment (4.51% fatty acids). The disappearance of docosahexaenoic acid was not different among the control, treatment 1, or treatment 2. These data indicated that malic acid did not promote the accumulation of vaccenic acid in ruminal fluid.