To investigate the incidence of dry eye in college students and the effect of different using time of visual display terminals (VDT) on the break-up time of the tear film (BUT), thirty-eight college students (44 eyes) were studied. All included eyes were divided into dry eye group (n=25) and healthy group (n=19) according to the diagnosis of dry eye. Visual acuity, intraocular pressure, ocular surface disease index (OSDI), BUT and schirmer testⅠwere applied to each subject. According to results of the normal test and homogeneity test of variance, Mann-Whitney U test, paired T-test and independent sample T-test were obtained. Results showed that there was no statistical difference in OSDI score between the dry eye group and the healthy group, but difference existed between the dry eye group and the healthy group in BUT (P =0.000), suggesting that there were still a part of students who did not receive the timely diagnosis of dry eye because of unconspicuous dry eye symptoms. There was significant difference in BUT before and after VDT (P =0.016) reading. However, there was no difference between the dry eye group and the healthy group in different VDT reading time groups, indicating that for both the dry eye group and the healthy group, long-term use of mobile phone screen would reduce tear film stability, but this instability of tear film made no difference between the dry eye group and the healthy group.