An association between cholecystectomy and metabolic syndrome has not been fully established. Here we analyzed the association between cholecystectomy and metabolic syndrome in a Chinese population of 5672 subjects who undergone annual health checkups at the First Affiliated Hospital, College of Medicine, Zhejiang University between January 2011 and December 2012. The prevalences of gallstones, cholecystectomy and metabolic syndrome were 6.0%, 3.6%, and 32.5%, respectively. The prevalence of metabolic syndrome was significantly higher in subjects with a history of cholecystectomy (63.5%) than in those with gallstones (47.0%) or in those without gallstone disease (30.3%; P<0.01 for both). Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that cholecystectomy was significantly associated with increased risk of metabolic syndrome (OR = 1.872; 95% CI: 1.193-2.937). However, the association of gallstones with metabolic syndrome was not statistically significant (OR = 1.267; 95% CI: 0.901-1.782). Altogether, our results suggest that cholecystectomy significantly increases the risk of metabolic syndrome.