At present

surgical resection is still the first choice for the treatment of primary hepatocellular carcinoma. However

due to the lack of typical clinical manifestations in early hepatocellular carcinoma

most cases have entered the advanced stage once symptoms and signs appear

which results in a poor surgical outcome. For these patients

multimodality therapy including interventional therapy

ablation therapy

targeted therapy

immunotherapy

and radiochemotherapy is adopted. With reference to relevant data

this article reviews the progress in multimodality therapy for primary hepatocellular carcinoma that is unsuitable for surgery.