Abstract: The number of pumping station and the consumption of pipes are decided by the operating pressure of oil pipeline, which influences the investment in pipeline construction and management at same time, so, the operating pressurte is an important parameter of pipeline design.For years there have been a general viewpoint that a high operating pressure and a long station spacing should be taken as an important index to the high level of oil pipeline development.The first precondition of increasing operating pressure is that the pump units must have a high working pressure and/or a heavier power, and the pipes used in pump station and/or trunk line can resistant to a higher operating pressure.Increasing the operating pressure can reduce the number of pump station but moreover the pipe consumption goes high, so the optimal operating pressure is the operating pressure selected at the time when the total investment is the lowest in pipeline construction.For this reason, the various factors influencing operating pressure of pipeline are analyzed and the optimal operating pressure is determined through derivation and calculation.It is considered that the optimal value of operating pressure is directly proportional to the allowable stress of the pipe used, and inversely proportional to the diameter value of the pipe.The optimal operating pressure will further increase along with the improvment of pipeline automatic control and expansion of pump units' power, as well as the increment of investment in pump station construction.