Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most common neoplasms. Little progress has been made in the diagnosis and treatment of HCC and its prognosis remains poor. Studies have increasingly found that long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) is involved in the regulation of the occurrence and development of HCC. To investigate the diagnostic and prognostic value of lncRNA in HCC, the current study examined 25 lncRNAs with differing levels of expression (according to the fold change) in microarray databases. Expression of LINC RP1130-1 was found to be markedly down-regulated in 51 HCC tissues compared to matching adjacent non-tumor liver tissues. The pattern of expression and clinical significance of LINC RP1130-1 were examined in HCC. The area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was 0.74 for LINC RP1130-1. The expression of LINC RP1130-1 was associated with clinical stage, the number of tumors, portal vein tumor thrombus (PVTT), and microvascular invasion (MVI). More importantly, patients with a low level of LINC RP1130-1 expression had a shorter recurrence-free survival (RFS) (n = 51, p < 0.05) than those with a high level of LINC RP1130-1 expression. Taken together, these findings indicate that a low level of LINC RP1130-1 expression in patients with HCC may be a powerful tumor biomarker, with potential clinical use in diagnosing and predicting the prognosis for patients with HCC.