Abstract: Objective To examine the short-term effects of meteorological factors on occurrence of hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD) in children in Rizhao. Methods A generalized additive Poisson model was applied to estimate the effects of meteorological factors on occurrence of HFMD in children in 2009-2012. Results During the study period, there were 26 827 HFMD cases, among which 26 619 were children under 10 years old, and the sex ratio was 1.63∶1. A positive effect of temperature was observed on lag 4-8 days (Excess risk［ER］=1.54%, 95% CI: 0.69% to 2.40% for 1 ℃ increase on lag 6 days). A positive effect of relative humidity was found on lag 5-7 days with the ER being 0.19% (95% CI: 0.07%-0.31%) for 1% of increase in relative humidity on lag 7 days. An adverse effect was observed for sunshine on lag 4-7 days (ER=-0.53%, 95% CI: -0.93% to -0.13% on lag 4 days). Conclusion This study suggests that meteorological factors might be important predictor of HFMD occurrence in children in Rizhao and should be considered in future disease control and prevention.