Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) were synthesized using catalytic chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method. Oxygen plasma treatment was applied to modify surface state of the CNTs synthesized for improvement of field emission performance. Surface state of the plasma treated CNTs was studied by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The surface states of the CNTs were changed as a function of plasma treatment time. The oxygen related carbon shift was moved toward higher binding energy with the plasma treatment time. This result implies that the oxygen plasma treatment changes the surface state effectively. While any shift in carbon 1s peak was not detected for the as grown CNTs, oxygen related carbon shift was detected for the plasma treated CNTs. Carbon shift implies that closed CNT tips were opened by the oxygen plasma and reacted with oxygen species. Since the field emission occurs at pentagons or dangling bonds of the CNT tips, the increase of carbon-oxygen bonds plays an important role in field emission behavior by increasing the number of electron emission sites resulting in improvement of the field emission performance.