As overshoot and oscillation phenomena will occur when a piezoelectric ceramic actuator is taken as a driving element for nano-positioning systems, this paper proposes a new piezoelectric ceramic displacement control method based on a home made high frequency phase-shifting electronic circuit and a heterodyne interferometer. On the experiments, it demonstrates that the piezoelectric ceramic could be locked actively and be driven step by step in a nanometric scale under a strictly controlled experimental environment. This controlled stepper piezoelectric actuator combined with a commercial macro stage achieves a displacement system with nanometric repeatability over a millimeter range. Experimental results show that this system has a repeatability smaller than 1 nm when it has over back and forth displacement of 5 mm and executes the step by step displacement with the step value of 5 nm near the target position. The positioning method avoids the mechanical defects of piezoelectric actuator and is characteristics by simpler structure, faster positioning and suitable for numerous applications in nanotechnology and ultra precision machining .