The extensive utilization of antibiotics in the pharmaceutical therapies and agricultural husbandry has led to the worldwide pollution in environments. In this study the photolysis behaviors of tetracycline (TC) and toxicity of its degradation products were investigated. The results showed that TC photolysis followed first-order kinetics. The photolysis rate was found to be dependent on the initial TC concentration and increasing TC concentration from 10 to 40mgl(-1) led to the decrease of the photolysis rate constant from 0.0045min(-1) to 0.0014min(-1). TC photolysis was highly pH-dependent and strongly enhanced at high pH value. Markedly elevated TC photolysis was also observed in the presence of nitrate and dissolved organic matter. Upon irradiation for 300min, only 15% reduction of total organic carbon (TOC) occurred in spite of quick conversion of 73% of TC, suggesting that a majority of TC transformed into intermediate products without complete mineralization. The intermediate products from TC photolysis were analyzed using high-performance liquid chromatography-electrospray ionisation-mass spectrometry (HPLC-ESI-MS) and the main photolysis products of TC were proposed. The toxicity of the photolysis compounds was evaluated using luminescent bacterium, and the results revealed that the toxicity increased with irradiation, indicative of a higher adversity risk of the degradation products of TC on bacteria upon photolysis.