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The aim of the present study was to investigate the expression and clinical significance of hypoxia-inducible factor 1a (HIF-1a), Snail and E-cadherin in ovarian cancer. The expression levels were assessed in a number of ovarian cancer cell lines and ovarian cancer tissues, and correlations between the expression of the three proteins and clinical pathological factors were analyzed. Transwell assays showed that the invasive ability of the ovarian cancer cell lines SKOV3 and ES-2 were significantly higher than those of TYK and 3AO (P<0.01). Furthermore, the expression levels of HIF-1a and Snail in SKOV3 and ES-2 were significantly higher than those in TYK and 3AO, whereas the expression levels of E-cadherin in SKOV3 and ES-2 were significantly lower than those in TYK and 3AO (P<0.05). In ovarian cancer tissues, the expression levels of HIF-1a, Snail and E-cadherin were correlated with clinical pathological factors (P<0.01); furthermore, there was a positive correlation between the expression levels of HIF-1a and Snail (r=0.231; P=0.021), and a negative correlation between the expression levels of Snail and that of E-cadherin (r=-0.225; P=0.028). HIF-1a was suggested to be able to suppress the expression of E-cadherin by upregulating Snail, thus serving an important role in invasion and metastasis of ovarian cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]