ObjectivesEndoscopic diagnosis of invasion depth of superficial esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (SESCC) by white-light imaging (WLI) modality remains difficult. This study aims to clarify WLI-based features which are predictive for invasion depth of SESCC.MethodsA two-phase study was performed by enrolling 1288 patients with 1396 SESCC lesions. Endoscopic appearances, clinical characteristics and post-operative pathological outcomes were collected and reviewed. The association between lesion features and invasion depth were analyzed. A predictive nomogram was constructed for prediction of invasion depth.ResultsAmong 1396 lesions in derivation and validation cohort, 1139 (81.6%), 194 (13.9%) and 63 (4.5%) lesions were diagnosed as lesions confined into the intraepithelium or the lamina propria mucosa (T1a-EP/LPM), lesions invading the muscularis mucosa (T1a-MM) or superficial submucosa (T1b-SM1) and tumor with moderate invasion into the submucosa or deeper submucosal invasion (≥ T1b-SM2), respectively. Lesion length > 2 cm (p< 0.001), wider circumferential extension (p< 0.001, 0.002 and 0.048 for > 3/4, 1/2–3/4 and 1/4–1/2 circumferential extension, respectively), surface unevenness (p< 0.001 for both type 0-IIa/0-IIc lesions and mixed type lesions), spontaneous bleeding (p< 0.001), granularity (p< 0.001) and nodules (p< 0.001) were identified as significant factors predictive for lesion depth. A nomogram based on these factors was constructed and the values of area under the Receiver Operating Characteristics curve were 0.89 and 0.90 in the internal and external patient cohort.ConclusionsOur study provides six WLI-based morphological features predicting for lesion depth of SESCC. Our findings will make endoscopic evaluation of invasion depth for SESCC more convenient by assessing these profiles.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s40001-023-01153-z.