BER-aware-based lightpath setup approach is proposed for GMPLS-controlled optical networks. The approach takes BER parameter into consideration during the lightpath setup process, including two BER information distribution schemes and one BER-based routing calculation strategy. Among the two distribution schemes, Signaling-based BER Distribution (SBD) is based on RSVP-TE signaling protocol and Advertisement-based BER Distribution (ABD) is based on OSPF-TE routing protocol.The simulation results show that the proposed approach reduces the blocking probability effectively and ABD obtains better performance than SBD.