OBJECTIVE Depression is one of the prevalent and prominent complex psychiatric diseases and the number of depressed patients has been on the rise globally during the recent decades.Xiaoyaosan,as a famous Chinese herbal formula,has been widely used in depression patients for a long time. However,the therapeutic mechanisms remain uncertain because of difficulty of depression pathophysiology and the lack of bioinformatic approach to understand the molecular connection. METHODS In this thesis,we applied a network pharmacology approach to explain the potential mechanisms between Xiaoyaosan and depression involved in oral bioavailability screening,drug-likeness assessment,caco-2 permeability,blood-brain barrier target recognition and network analysis. RESULTS 66 active compounds in Xiaoyaosan formula with favorable pharmacokinetic profiles are predicted as active compounds for anti-depression treatment. Network analyses show that these 66 compounds target 40depression-associated proteins including especially HTR2A,NR 3C1,MAOB,XDH and CNR2. These proteins are mainly involved in the neuroactive ligand-receptor interaction,serotonergic synapse,cAMP signaling pathways and calcium signaling pathways. CONCLUSION The integrated network pharmacology method is an effective approach to illustrate the anti-depression mechanisms of herbs,and this in silico approach can be applied in drug discovery.