Background In the scenario of lung lesions, the differential diagnosis is important, since the treatment is determined by the characteristics of the lesion. The goal in the evaluation of pulmonary lesions is to distinguish malignant lesions from benign lesions in a non-invasive manner as possible. Since, CT is not sufficient to accurately distinguish malignant nodules from benign nodules and patients with benign nodules might undergo invasive diagnostic methods, such as lung biopsy or video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery, to rule out a malignancy. Now, MRI performed by using diffusion-weighted (DW) can offer both qualitative and quantitative information that can be helpful for tumour assessment. Moreover, lesion‐to‐spinal cord signal intensity ratio (LSR) has also been shown to be useful for the differentiation of lung lesions. Quantitative tumour assessment is possible by the calculation of ADC. Results A total of 30 patients were eligible for inclusion in our final analysis; with male/female case number about 10/20 (33.3%/ 66.7%) and age range from 20 to 74 (46.8 ± 14.9) were subjected to MRI study and MRI diffusion. Sensitivity analysis showed that ADC mean, and ADC min value can significantly predict malignant lung lesions using cutoff point < 1.53 and < 1.34 respectively, with sensitivity 75%, 56.3%, and specificity 92.9%, 100% with p values 0.001, and 0.005 respectively. SI lesion can significantly predict malignant lung lesions using cutoff point > 502.8, with sensitivity 92.9% and specificity 68.7%, AUC 89.3% and p value 0.0001. Lesion-to-spinal cord signal intensity ratio (LSR) can significantly predict malignant lung lesions using cutoff point > 1.3, with sensitivity 85.7% and specificity 75%, AUC 79.7% and p value 0.006. Conclusions This study confirmed that the DWI combined with ADC value and LSR is effective and valuable tool in differentiation of pulmonary lesions whether benign or malignant which is considered to be noninvasive alternative tool for the characterization of pulmonary lesions. We recommend before invasive intervention to perform diffusion MRI and LSR as and important aid for proper diagnosis.