Objective:To investigate the clinical significance of MET gene amplification in patients with gastric cancer in the palliative setting.Methods:MET amplification was assessed using fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) in 50 patients and quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) in 326 patients;259 patients treated with first-line fluoropyrimidine and platinum were included for survival analysis.Results:The results of FISH and qPCR indicated that the c-MET/CEP7 ratio was correlated with gene copy number.The optimal cutoff value for the copy number using qPCR to detect MET gene amplification with FISH was 5 (κ=0.778,P＜0.001).Twenty-one out of 326 patients (6.4％) were identified as MET amplification with a copy number of ＞5 detected by qPCR.MET-amplified gastric cancer was associated with an East Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) performance status (PS) score of＞2 (33.3％ vs.10.5％ P=0.007),peritoneal metastasis (76.2％ vs.46.2％,P=0.008),and elevated bilirubin levels (28.6％ vs.7.3％,P=0.006).The median overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) were 11.9 and 5.6 months,respectively.MET-amplified gastric cancer was not associated with survival outcomes [hazard ratio (HR)=0.68,95％ confidence interval (95％ CI):0.35-1.32,P=0.254 for PFS;HR=0.68,95％ CI:0.35-1.32,P=0.251 for OS].Conclusions:qPCR can be used to detect MET gene amplification.MET amplification was not a predictor of poor prognosis in patients with metastatic or unresectable gastric cancer.