This study was aimed to investigate the characteristics of chromosome karyotype abnormality in patients with acute myeloid leukemia. 379 cases of de novo acute myeloid leukemia were enrolled in this study. Chromosome preparations were made on bone marrow cells by using direct method or short-term culture. Chromosome karyotypes were analyzed by R-banding technique. The results indicated that 216 out of 379 patients had clonal chromosome aberrations with the percentage of 56.99%, including 19 kinds of balanced translocations and 70 kinds of chromosome gain or loss. The most common structure and numerical abnormalities were t(15;17) and -Y with the percentage of 25.86% and 5.80%, respectively. -Y was accompanied by t(8;21) in 90.9% of the -Y abnormality cases, which accounted for 40.81% of t(8;21) positive cases. The abnormality of M(3) was significantly higher than the other FAB subtypes (p < 0.05). No significance was found between the male and female groups for the chromosome aberrations (p > 0.05). In conclusion, some specific chromosome aberrations are correlated with specific FAB subtype, which may contribute to the clinical diagnosis and subtyping of the disease.