One hundred and twenty Chinese adults’ facial halves were selected for this study. The description of the mandibular ramus of the facial nerve was presented under 4 items: (1) the relationship with the lower border of the mandible, (2) the number of its rami, (3) the relationship with the retromandibular vein, the facial vein or the facial artery, and (4) its anastomoses with the buccal ramus and/or the cervical ramus. In these specimens, anterior to the facial artery, 90% of the mandibular rami ran above the lower border of the mandible, and 10% of the mandibular rami ran below the lower border of the mandible. Posterior to the facial artery, 67% of the mandibular rami ran above the lower border of the mandible, and 33% of the lowest mandibular rami passed in an arc with an average of 0.95 cm (the lowest point being 3 cm or less) below the lower border of the mandible. In 32% of the specimens the mandibular ramus had no branch and in 68% of the specimens, the mandibular ramus had two or more rami. There were 100% of the mandibular rami lying superficially to the retromandibular vein and the facial vein, while in 5% of the specimens, some other mandibular rami ran deeply to the facial vein. In 83 % of the specimens the mandibular rami lay only superficially to the facial artery and in only 2% deeply to the facial artery. The remaining 15% ran both deeply and superficially to the facial artery. There were 60% of the specimens in which the mandibular rami had one or more anastomoses with the buccal rami. In addition, in 12% of the facial halves, the mandibular rami had one anastomosis with the cervical ramus. However, only 4% of the mandibular rami had anastomosing branches with both the buccal and the cervical rami. The results of this study indicate that (1) it is recommended and safe to make an incision line at least 0.5 cm below the lower border of the mandible while doing surgeries such as radical neck dissection and open reduction for mandibular angle fracture anterior to the facial artery and 2 finger breadths or 3 cm below the lower border of the mandible while doing the same surgeries posterior to the facial artery, (2) most of the mandibular rami have two branches innervating the depressor muscles of the lip (3) the retromandibular vein can be used as a guide during approaching the mandibular ramus at the mandibular angle and (4) the anastomoses with the buccal and/or the cervical ramus may provide additional innervation to the depressor muscles of the lip. Therefore, our findings suggest the existence of an ethnic variation and the necessity of a more accurate method of approaching the mandibular ramus in clinical practice.