Introduction: Many patients with upper gastrointestinal malignancies present with locally advanced or metastatic disease and therefore accurate staging assists in the appropriate treatment selection for cure or palliation.   Even after modern preoperative imaging studies (abdominal ultrasound, CT scan and MRI), many patients are found to have unsuspected metastases and /or irresectable disease at exploration. Aim of the work: To evaluate the role of diagnostic laparoscopy in detection of small metastases, and assessment of resectability in patients with upper gastrointestinal malignancies. Patients and methods: This is a prospective study of 57 patients with primary upper gastrointestinal malignancy, admitted to Menoufyia University Hospital between April 2005 and April 2009. Diagnostic laparoscopy was performed under general anesthesia immediately before scheduled exploratory laparotomy for all patients. The sensitivity and diagnostic accuracy of laparoscopy for distant metastases and tumor resectability were assessed against the findings on preoperative investigations and open surgery. Results: The mean operative time for diagnostic laparoscopy was 18±2.387 min. Diagnostic laparoscopy detected metastatic disease in 15/57 (26.3%) patients, so those patients avoided unneeded exploratory laparotomy. The mean hospital stay for patients in whom diagnostic laparoscopy was done without laparotomy, as patients had metastatic disease was 1±0.231 day. Diagnostic laparoscopy was sensitive in detecting the un-resectable tumors in (83.3%) of patients and this was significantly higher than the sensitivity of preoperative investigation alone (61.4%) P < 0.05. The overall morbidity of staging laparoscopy was minimal. Conclusion: Diagnostic laparoscopy is a safe and effective modality in patients with gastrointestinal tumors. It helps in avoiding unnecessary laparotomies in a significant number of patients.