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Seafood traceability is an important means of ensuring the quality of local seafood. Jellyfish are an important edible resource with a large yield on a global scale. Different species of pickled jellyfish, a traditional Chinese food, cannot be differentiated solely from the appearance of the product due to its special processing methods. In this paper, two species of jellyfish, R. esculentum and S. meleagris , were identified by PCR-RFLP technique. The genetic identification of the jellyfish R. esculentum and S. meleagris was based on PCR amplification of a common 651 bp fragment of the 16S rRNA gene, followed by digestion of four restriction enzymes, Hind III, Hpa I, Xho I and Dra I, respectively. The results showed that the two species of fresh jellyfish could be identified clearly, as could the pickled R. esculentum. To verify this result, PCR-RFLP was applied to authenticate four kinds of commercial pickled jellyfish. The electrophoretogram clearly showed that R. esculentum and S. meleagris were easily and accurately authenticated. This PCR-RFLP system has the potential to become an effective method for identifying the jellyfish products from Liaoning Province of China. • Seafood traceability is an important means to ensure the quality of local featured seafood. • Jellyfish is an important edible resource as palatable food for thousands years. • Fresh jellyfish must be processed into dry goods sales, known as pickled jellyfish. • PCR-RFLP method have high sensitivity and validity for provenance identification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]