Plasma concentrations of adiponectin have been shown to be decreased in patients with obesity, cardiovascular diseases, hypertension and metabolic syndrome. Recent studies have found that adiponectin reduces lipid accumulation in macrophage foam cells which may impact the development of atherosclerosis. However, it remains unclear whether adiponectin is involved in the process of lipid accumulation during myogenesis. Using C2C12 myoblasts, we investigated the effect of adiponectin on intramyocellular lipid accumulation during myogenesis. The results showed that intracellular lipid accumulation is significantly decreased during C2C12 differentiation, apparently due to increased fatty acid oxidation and decreased fatty acid synthesis during this process. C2C12 cells transiently transfected with adiponectin gene showed reduced lipid accumulation as compared to controls. Further experiments demonstrated that adiponectin can suppress lipid accumulation by increasing fatty acid oxidation during C2C12 myogenesis.