The recent trends of rotating machinery demand high speed and high temperature operation, and the bearing with new material is required to be developed. Ceramic, especially silicon nitride, have been receiving attention as alternative material to conventional bearing steel. Ceramic ball bearing offers major performance advantages over steel bearing, for instance, high speed, maginal lubrication, high temperature, improved corrosion resistance and nonmagnetic capabilities etc.. In this paper, the mechanical characteristics of ceramic ball bearing (hybrid ceramic bearing and all ceramic bearing) were investigated, and the characteristics of ceramic bearing were compared with that of steel bearing. Deep groove ball bearing 6208 was taken the object of analysis. The main results of analysis were followings: the radial stiffness of hybrid and all ceramic bearing were 112% and 130% that of steel bearing, and the axial stiffness of all ceramic bearing was 110% that of steel bearing. According as rotating speed was up, the ball load, the contact angle, the contact stress and the spin-to-roll ratio between ball and raceway of ceramic bearing were far smaller than these of steel bearing. And there was not a significant difference between the minimum film thickness of ceramic bearing and steel bearing. It is expected that this research is contributed to enhanced fundamental technology for the practical applications of ceramic ball bearing.