Objective To test eight kinds of synthetical colorants by PWAX solid phase extraction –HPLC, and discuss the feasibility of this mothod. Method The liquid samples were purified by PWAX SPE column, disposable extraction and purification the synthetical colorants (lemon yellow, amaranth, indicarmine, carmine, sunset yellow, allura red, brilliant blue, erythrosine) in foods,separated in the C₁₈ column with methanol and ammonium acetate as mobile phase, detected by 400-800nm multi-wavelength PDA method after gradient elution.Quantified by external standard method. Results Within the concentration range of 0.2-20 μg/ml, the correlation coefficients of all the target substances were more than 0.99988, the lowest concentration of the test liquid was 0.020 μg/ml, the lowest detection limit was 0.020mg/kg.Recovery rate of different sample matrices were 73.0%-102.7%,RSD was 0.46%-5.35%. Conclusion The method had manig advantages such as well pigment adsorption and desorption effects,reducting the amount of reagents, simplicity and conveniency, good separation degree etal.the chromatographic separation of eight kinds of coloring agents was good by HPLC method.The recovery and precision of the method were satisfactory.It was suitable to detect and analyze various synthetic colorants in different food samples.