Depositing of $TiO_2$ nanoparticles on cellulose fiber surface has potential technological applications in the field of photocatalysis. With this motivation, multilayers composed of lignosulfonates (LS) and $TiO_2$ nanoparticles were constructed on cellulose fiber surface via layer-by-layer (LBL) self-assembly technique. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), zeta potential measurement and atomic force microscopy (AFM) were used to characterize the $LS/TiO_2$ multilayers on cellulose fiber surface. Moreover, the photocatalytic activities of modified cellulose fibers (decomposition of methyl orange and antibacterial test) were investigated. The decomposition efficiency of methyl orange for a $(LS/TiO_2)_5$ multilayer modified cellulose fibers was 74.7 % under 5 h UV irradiation. Photocatalytic decomposition efficiency of methyl orange by $LS/TiO_2$ multilayer modified cellulose fibers under the same UV irradiation time increased linearly with the number of bilayers. Antibacterial tests results revealed that the cellulose fibers modified with $LS/TiO_2$ multilayers exhibited excellent antibacterial activity against E.coil. The degree of E.coil growth inhibition for a $(LS/TiO_2)_5$ multilayer modified cellulose fiber reached as high as 93 %. In addition, the effect of $LS/TiO_2$ multilayers on properties of handsheets made from modified cellulose fibers was also considered. The air permeability of the handsheet prepared from fibers modified with $TiO_2/LS$ multilayers had 6.1-24.3 % higher compared with that of handsheet prepared from original fibers. The wetting properties measurement results demonstrated that the water contact angle of handsheet oscillated with the increasing number of layers depended on building block which was in the outermost layer.