In this study,an orthogonal experiment was performed to explore the optimal extraction technique of water-soluble polysaccharides from pumpkin.Moreover,the polysaccharides' capabilities to scavenge ·OH and DPPH· and their gross reducing power was measured with Vc and BHT as references.In the orthogonal experiment,various factors including temperature,extraction time,solid-liquid ratio,were optimized.The results showed that the polysaccharides extracted from pumpkin are endowed with strong in vitro antioxidant properties.Our study provided references for the extraction of pumpkin polysaccharides and for their use as antioxidants.