Objective This paper describes a functional electrical stimulation (FES) system based on the body area network (BAN) for helping the stroke survivors and SCI patients in the rehabilitation.This FES system not only has very high performance to perform the stimulation and control deciding required in the application of relearning or restoring the motor function, but also has the high flexibility to expand to other related clinical applications such as the medical monitoring platform and rehabilitation robotic.Methods To achieve the aim, we design three main hardware components of the networked FES system including a master unit (MU), a distributed stimulation-sensor unit (DSSU), and a clinical computer.And we also develop a Body Area Network and use it to organize the whole FES system following the network management.The MU as the controller of this system manages all distributed stimulation-sensor units as the stimulation channels as the network node in BAN.In this structure, the FES system can conveniently provide the multi-channel preprogrammed stimulation current at the same time.Results We have completed a prototype of system including the hardware and software developments.The test of the FES system shows that the stimulation current amplitude ranges from 1 mA to 58 mA and that the stimulation pulse width can be from 10 μs to 1000 ts with 1 μs resolution.Conclusion The evaluation test indicates that the system performance meets design specifications.The BAN FES system has been designed and tested for feasibility.The MU and DSSU design in the networked FES system is proposed and a prototype has been constructed and tested in laboratory.