Background Critical care nurses face several challenges in providing safe, evidence-based care for critical patients. Evidence-based practices are important to improve the overall quality of patient care, enhance nursing practice, and increase confidence in evidence-based decision-making. Thus, this study was intended to assess evidence-based practice knowledge and utilization of the practice on nurses working in the adult intensive care units. Methods Institutional based cross-sectional study was employed on 135 randomly selected nurses working in adult intensive care units of federal public hospitals in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from April 3 to December 21, 2020. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire through face-to-face interviews. Then, it was entered into Epi data version 4.4.2.1, and exported to SPSS version 25 for analysis. In the bivariate logistic regression analysis, predictors variables with p< 0.25 were fitted to multivariate analysis. Then, the adjusted odds ratio with 95% CI was used to report the association at P< 0.05. Results Among the study participants, about 92(68.1%) and 115(85.2%) of them were found to have good knowledge and utilization of evidence-based practice, respectively. Predictors like difficulty to properly interpret research results (AOR=11.36; 95% CI: 1.86-69.39), and insufficient resources to implement changes in practice (AOR=4.44; 95% CI: 1.05-18.80) were associated with poor knowledge of evidence-based practice. Moreover, nurses who were not able to interpret research results, lack of nursing colleague support, and insufficient time were significantly associated with poor utilization (P<0.05). Conclusion The knowledge and utilization of evidence-based practice among nurses was found to be high compared to the findings of former studies. Inability to properly interpret research results, lack of confidence, insufficient time, and lack of nursing colleague support were independently associated with poor knowledge and utilization of evidence-based practices among nurses working in adult ICU nurses.