The aim of this study was to compare the safety and morbidity of laparoscopic versus laparotomic comprehensive staging of apparent early stage ovarian cancer.In this retrospective study, the outcomes of patients with apparent stage I ovarian cancer who underwent laparoscopic or laparotomic comprehensive surgical staging from January 2002 to January 2014 were evaluated. The long-term survival of patients with early ovarian cancer was compared.Forty-two patients were treated by laparoscopy, and 50 were treated by laparotomy. The median operative time was 200 minutes in the laparoscopy group and 240 minutes in the laparotomy group (P >0.05). The median length of hospital stay was 3 days in the laparoscopy group and 7 days in the laparotomy group (P <0.05). Following laparoscopic and laparotomic staging, the cancer was upstaged for 9 (21.4%) and 10 (20.0%) women, respectively. The median follow-up time was 82 months in the laparoscopic and laparotomic groups, respectively. Excluding the upstaged patients, no recurrence was observed in the present study, and the overall survival and 5-year survival rates were 100% in both the laparoscopy and laparotomy groups.Laparoscopic and laparotomic comprehensive staging of early ovarian cancer were similar in terms of staging adequacy, accuracy and survival rate. Laparoscopic staging was associated with a significantly reduced hospital stay. Prospective randomized trials are required to evaluate the overall oncologic outcomes.