Purpose: This study was conducted to assess life stress, depression, self-esteem in nursing students. Methods: We performed a cross-sectional research design. A structured questionnaire was designed to collect data on participants' socio- demographics, life stress(interpersonal relationship & task-related events), depression and self-esteem in June 2012. Descriptive statistics, t-test, one-way ANOVA, Pearson correlation coefficient were applied to data analysis. A total of 182 nursing students were surveyed. Results: The mean score for life stress was 1.77 and depression was 1.27 and self-esteem was 2.73. The score of the task-related life stress was higher than that of the interpersonal life stress. Life stress with subjects' socio-demographics was related to meal time, satisfaction with campus life, appearance. Depression with subjects' socio-demographics was related to satisfaction with campus life, appearance. Self-esteem with subjects' socio-demographics was related to personality, meal time, satisfaction with campus life, appearance. Self-esteem was negatively associated with task-related life stress and depression. Life stress was positively associated with depression. Conclusion: This study could be a reference to improve the self-esteem of nursing students.