Objective To systematically evaluate the clinical value of remote ischemic preconditioning (RIPC) in elective percutaneous coronary intervention (EPCI). Methods We electronically searched databases including PubMed, EMbase, The Cochrane Library (Issue 6, 2015), WanFang Data, CBM and CNKI from inception to June 2016, to collect randomized controlled trials (RCTs) about RIPC in EPCI. Two reviewers independently screened literature, extracted data and assessed the risk of bias of included studies. Then, meta-analysis was performed using RevMan 5.3 software. Results Nine RCTs involving 1 099 patients were included. The results of meta-analysis showed that: There were no significant difference in the level of troponin I and T between the RIPC group and the control group (SMD=–0.24, 95%CI –0.63 to 0.16,P=0.24). Sensitive analysis showed that with 3×5–min remote preconditioning protocol, there was still no significant difference in the level of troponin I and T between the two groups (SMD=–0.16, 95%CI –0.36 to 0.04,P=0.12). Another, RIPC could significantly reduce the incidence of peri–procedural myocardial infarctions (RD=–0.14, 95%CI –0.20 to –0.08,P<0.000 01) and the risk of ST-segment deviation in the elective PCI procedure (RD=–0.17, 95%CI –0.26 to –0.07,P=0.000 6), but there was no significant difference in postoperative eGFR between both groups (SMD=–0.03, 95%CI –0.18 to 0.12,P=0.71). Conclusion RIPC can significant reduce the incidence of peri-procedural myocardial infarctions, and the risk of ST-segment deviation in the elective PCI procedure. Due to limited quality and quantity of the included studies, more high quality studies are needed to verify the above conclusion.