Objective: To explore whether adiponectin affects the proliferation and hypertrophy of articular chondrocytes in patients with idiopathic scoliosis (IS) or not. Methods: Plasma adiponectin levels in patients with IS and control group were detected by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay, and the expression levels of adiponectin and its receptor AdipoR1, chondrocyte marker ColⅡ and hypertrophy marker ColX were detected by Western blot. Different concentration of Adiponectin was used to stimulate chondrocytes from IS group, and the changes of the related proteins in chondrocytes were detected. Results: The plasma adiponectin levels of IS patients was significantly higher than that of the control group. And further analysis according to the sex showed that increased plasma adiponectin levels were found in both female and male IS patients compared to the female and male control group respectively. The protein levels of adiponectin, AdipoR1 and ColⅡ in chondrocytes of IS patients were upregulated compared to those of the control group, while the protein level of ColX was decreased in IS-chondrocytes. In addition, after stimulation of adiponectin at different concentration, the expression levels of AdipoR1 remarkedly increased in a concentration dependent manner, and the protein levels of ColⅡ and anti-apoptotic factor Bcl2 also significantly increased, but the protein levels of ColX and pro-apoptotic factor Bax decreased in IS-chondrocytes. Conclusion: The increased plasma adiponectin levels in patients with IS can promote the proliferation of chondrocytes and inhibit the hypertrophy by upregulating AdipoR1, Bcl2 and ColⅡ, and downregulating Bax and ColX.