Primary objective: To investigate the epidemiological characteristics of paediatric inpatients with traumatic brain injury (TBI) in China. Research design: The Chinese Trauma Database (CTD), a nationwide register system based on hospital admission data, contains diagnosis and treatment information for trauma inpatients in over 200 military-managed public-service hospitals in China. Using the ICD-9 coding, the data for children with TBI aged 0–17 years between 2001 and 2007 were retrieved. Methods and procedures: The demographic characteristics, admission time, injury cause, severity and treatment outcomes of paediatric inpatients with TBI were analysed. Main outcomes and results: A total of 26,028 paediatric inpatients with TBI (69.52% male, 30.48% female) were included in the CTD. Motor vehicle traffic (MVT) accidents, falls and assaults were the primary causes of injury. Falls were the leading cause of TBI in children aged 0–4 years, and MVT was the leading cause of TBI in children aged 5–17 years. According to the abbreviated injury scale, 37.20% of the TBI cases were mild, 25.15% were moderate, 24.81% were severe and 12.84% were critically severe. Conclusion: Chinese authorities should develop targeted measures to reduce children injuries based on the leading causes of TBI in the different age groups, particularly MVT, falls and assaults.