Citation analysis was applied to identify the influential studies in the specific field. More and more literature related to carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) have been published in recent years. To our knowledge, no one has performed a citation analysis of CTS. Thus, our study identified the top 50 influential articles pertaining to CTS and conduct an analysis of their characteristics.The Web of Science database was used to identify all the articles from 1900 to 2020. We obtained the top 50 articles ranked by citation times, and articles were included and excluded based on the relevance to CTS. Also, we collected the information about journal name, level of evidence, source country and institution, and research type for further analysis.The top 50 articles were published between 1959 and 2012. The number of citations ranged from 151 to 1083. The citation density was between 3.23 and 40.27 per year. Muscle Nerve published most articles in CTS research, followed by Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery American Volume. The USA was the leading country, and all the top 5 institutions were from the USA. Katz JN with the highest h-index published most articles. Level III was the most common evidence level.We identified the top 50 cited articles related to CTS. These influential articles might provide researchers with a comprehensive list of the major contribution related to CTS research.Copyright © 2022 the Author(s). Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc.