To approach the related mechanisms of exogenous salicylic acid (SA) in improving plant drought-resistance, this paper studied the effects of applying exogenous SA to the rhizosphere on the plant growth, membrane lipid peroxidation, proline accumulation, water use efficiency, net photosynthetic rate (Pn), and chlorophyll fluorescence parameters of cucumber (Cucumis sativus) seedlings under drought stresses (60% and 50% of saturated water capacity). Applying SA relieved the inhibitory effects of drought stress on plant growth, Pn, and water use efficiency, decreased membrane lipid peroxidation, and promoted proline accumulation. Meanwhile, the SA decreased the decrements of the maximum photochemical efficiency of PS II, actual photochemical efficiency of PS II, potential activity of PS II, effective photochemical efficiency of PS II, and photochemical quenching coefficient under drought stress significantly, and limited the increase of non-photochemical quenching coefficient. All the results suggested that applying exogenous SA could alleviate the oxidation damage of cell membrane resulted from the drought-caused membrane lipid peroxidation, improve the Pn by increasing PS II activity to benefit water utilization, enhance the regulation capability of osmosis to decrease water loss and increase water use efficiency, and thereby, improve the plant drought-resistance.