Tree shrew is a novel and high-quality experimental animal model. In this study, the real-time polymerase chain reaction methods were established to detect infection-related cytokines interleukin-6 (IL-6), IL-8, IL-10, IL-17A, interferon-γ (IFN-γ) and housekeeping gene glyceraldehyde-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) of tree shrew. The results indicated that the establised methods had good specificity. The high point of the linear range of these reagents reached 1 × 1010 copies, and the low points ranged from 10 copies (IL-6, IL-17A), 100 copies (IL-10, GAPDH) to 1 000 copies (IL-8, IFN-γ). In this interval, the linear correlation coefficient R2 of each reagent was greater than 0.99. The lowest detectable values of IL-6, IL-8, IL-10, IL-17A, IFN-γ and GAPDH were 8, 8, 4, 8, 128 and 4 copies, respectively. The results showed that the established detection methods had good specificity, sensitivity and wide linear range. The methods were suitable for detection of multiple concentration range samples, and could be used for the subsequent studies of tree shrew cytokines.