Previous case-control studies on the association of interleukin-17F (IL-17F) T7488C polymorphism and cancer risk have yielded conflicting and inconclusive findings. We performed a meta-analysis by pooling all currently available data to acquire a more precise estimation of the association. A comprehensive literature screening from the PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, and Wanfang databases was performed for eligible publications without language restrictions. The pooled odds ratios (ORs) with corresponding 95 % confidence intervals (95 % CIs) were calculated. According to the inclusion criteria, a total of nine case-control studies with 3,034 cases and 3,694 controls were included. Overall, the pooled ORs showed that IL-17F T7488C polymorphism was associated with neither increased nor decreased risk of cancer. However, the IL-17F T7488C polymorphism exerted risk effect on cancer in population-based case-control studies when stratifying analysis by source of controls (C vs T OR = 1.24, 95 % CI, 1.10-1.40, pooled OR (POR) < 0.001; TC vs TT OR = 1.28, 95 % CI, 1.11-1.48, POR = 0.001; CC + TC vs TT OR = 1.29, 95 % CI, 1.12-1.48, POR < 0.001). Additionally, the variant genotypes of IL-17F T7488C could alter the risk of gastric cancer under the following comparisons (C vs T OR = 1.29, 95 % CI, 1.13-1.47, POR < 0.001; TC vs TT OR = 1.35, 95 % CI, 1.14-1.60, POR < 0.001; CC + TC vs TT OR = 1.35, 95 % CI, 1.15-1.58, POR < 0.001). Sensitivity analysis by sequential omission of single study did not materially alter the pooled findings. The present meta-analysis suggests that the IL-17F T7488C polymorphism may modify the risk of cancer, particularly gastric cancer. However, the precise association needs to be elucidated by more individual studies with sufficient statistical power.