Primary pulmonary non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (PPL) is a rare extranodal lymphoid neoplasm. The present knowledge of this entity is vague and minimal. A total of 29 patients diagnosed with PPL at Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center in China were retrospectively analyzed. Nineteen patients had mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue (MALT) lymphoma, nine had diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), and one had plasmacytic lymphoma. Six patients received PET/CT scans before treatment, and mean maximum standardized uptake values (mSUVs) were much higher in the DLBCL cases (n = 3) than in the MALT lymphoma cases (n = 3). The 3-year overall survival (OS) rate was 79.3%. Cox regression analysis showed that hilar/mediastinal lymphadenopathy (LAP) was an independent predictor of survival (P = 0.029). The mean survival time (MST) was 75.5 months for patients who underwent surgery and 65.7 months for those who didn't (P = 0.38). The MST was 77.4 months for patients treated with rituximab and 54.1 months for those not treated with rituximab (P = 0.101). Clinical characteristics in our study were partly similar to those previously reported. However, we found that hilar/mediastinal LAP seemed to be an effective prognostic factor in Chinese PPL patients. The role of surgery and rituximab in the management of PPL warrants further investigation.