ObjectiveTo build a small-sample ultra-widefield fundus images (UWFI) multi-disease classification artificial intelligence model, and initially explore the ability of artificial intelligence to classify UWFI multi-disease tasks. MethodsA retrospective study. From 2016 to 2021, 1 608 images from 1 123 patients who attended the Eye Center of the Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University and underwent UWFI examination were used for UWFI multi-disease classification artificial intelligence model construction. Among them, 320, 330, 319, 268, and 371 images were used for diabetic retinopathy (DR), retinal vein occlusion (RVO), pathological myopia (PM), retinal detachment (RD), and normal fundus images, respectively. 135 images from 106 patients at the Tianjin Medical University Eye Hospital were used as the external test set. EfficientNet-B7 was selected as the backbone network for classification analysis of the included UWFI images. The performance of the UWFI multi-task classification model was assessed using the receiver operating characteristic curve, area under the curve (AUC), sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy. All data were expressed using numerical values and 95% confidence intervals (CI). The datasets were trained on the network models ResNet50 and ResNet101 and tested on an external test set to compare and observe the performance of EfficientNet with the 2 models mentioned above. ResultsThe overall classification accuracy of the UWFI multi-disease classification artificial intelligence model on the internal and external test sets was 92.57% (95%CI 91.13%-92.92%) and 88.89% (95%CI 88.11%-90.02%), respectively. These were 96.62% and 92.59% for normal fundus, 95.95% and 95.56% for DR, 96.62% and 98.52% for RVO, 98.65% and 97.04% for PM, and 97.30% and 94.07% for RD, respectively. The mean AUC on the internal and external test sets was 0.993 and 0.983, respectively, with 0.994 and 0.939 for normal fundus, 0.999 and 0.995 for DR, 0.985 and 1.000 for RVO, 0.991 and 0.993 for PM and 0.995 and 0.990 for RD, respectively. EfficientNet performed better than the ResNet50 and ResNet101 models on both the internal and external test sets. ConclusionThe preliminary UWFI multi-disease classification artificial intelligence model using small samples constructed in this study is able to achieve a high accuracy rate, and the model may have some value in assisting clinical screening and diagnosis.