The purpose of this study was to conduct a comprehensive review and meta-analysis to investigate the possible relationship of lymphatic vessel invasion (LVI) and lymphatic vessel density (LVD), evaluated using immunohistochemistry, with survival and clinicopathological parameters in patients with gastric carcinoma. The principal result of this meta-analysis was the statistically significant correlation between LVI and presence of lymph node metastasis. This finding, in view of previous data showing that lymph node metastasis is associated with decreased survival, suggests that LVI may be a negative prognostic factor in gastric carcinoma. In contrast, LVD, whether assessed overall, intratumorally, or peritumorally, showed no statistically significant correlation with survival. The major conclusion of this meta-analysis is that LVI is an important indicator of aggressiveness of gastric carcinomas and may be a negative prognostic factor because of the strong association between LVI and presence of lymph node metastasis.