Objective To evaluate the clinical value of Sysmex XN-9000 hematology analyzer for detecting peripheral blood nucleated red blood cells (NRBC). Methods A total of 16 273 peripheral blood samples were collected and examined by Sysmex XN-9000 hematology analyzer and microscopic manual detection. The sensitivity, specificity and positive prediction value and negative predictive value of NRBC were measured by manual measurement under microscope. The 248 specimens positive by both methods were used as subjects, and the correlation between the two methods for detecting NRBC was analyzed. The disease types of 277 patients positive of NRBC were analyzed by microscopic examination. Results The sensitivity of NRBC detected by Sysmex XN-9000 hematology analyzer was 89.5%, specificity was 99.6%, positive predictive value was 80.5%, and negative predictive value was 99.8%. There was a positive correlation between the percentages of NRBC detected by the two methods (r_s=0.813, P<0.001). Among the 277 NRBC-positive patients, 173 had hematological diseases and 104 had no hematologic diseases, and there were significant differences in NRBC counts between the two groups (median:0.38×10⁹/L vs 0.16×10⁹/L, P<0.05), and the percentages of NRBC were not significantly different (median:2.95% vs 3.60%, P=0.835 1). Among patients with hematological diseases, NRBC was mainly present in patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (31 cases), acute myeloid leukemia (55 cases), malignant lymphoma (39 cases) and multiple myeloma (18 cases). Among patients without hematologic diseases, NRBC was mainly present in those with solid cancer (24 cases) and cirrhosis hemorrhage (36 cases). Conclusion The Sysmex XN-9000 hematology analyzer can detect NRBC with high accuracy, and it thus has a promising clinical application value.