A series of high nitrogen steels were studied by using thermodynamic calculations to investigate the effect of manganese on the stability of austenite. Surprisingly, it was found that the austenite stabilizing ability of manganese was strongly weakened by chromium, but it was strengthened by molybdenum. In addition, with an increase of manganese content, the ferrite stabilizing ability of chromium significantly increased, but that of molybdenum decreased. Therefore, strong interactions exist between manganese and the other alloying elements, which should be the main reason for the difference among different constituent diagrams.