Pectin lyase finds applications in the degumming and retting of plant fibers where it degrades highly methylesterified pectin without prior action of any other pectinase. Response surface methodology (RSM) has been frequently utilized for the optimization of production process of industrially important enzymes from microbes. In the present work, fermentation conditions for the production of pectin lyase from Bacillus cereus were optimized using the factorial and central composite design of RSM. The cubic order polynomial regression model was found to be adequate and significant with a determination coefficient R 2 of 0.9505 (p<0.0001). The ANOVA analysis and three dimensional surface plots confirmed interaction among variables. The optimum values of variables were found to be pectin 4% (w/v), sodium carbonate 1% (w/v), manganese sulfate 0.055% (w/v) and magnesium sulfate 0.018% (w/v) at 150 rpm under response surface curves. After optimization, the experimental value of maximum activity of enzyme (3.37 U/ml) was found higher but close to the predicted value (2.68 U/ml) and the enzyme activity increased by 1.32 fold (32.16%).