Salicylic acid (SA) is a key natural component that mediates local and systemic resistance to pathogens in many dicotyledonous species. However, its function is controversial in disease resistance in rice plants. Here, we show that the SA signaling is involved in both pathogen-associated-molecular-patterns triggered immunity (PTI) and effector triggered immunity (ETI) to Xanthomonas oryzae pv. Oryzae (Xoo) mediated by the recessive gene xa5, in which OsNPR3.3 plays an important role through interacting with TGAL11. Rice plants containing homozygous xa5 gene respond positively to exogenous SA, and their endogenous SA levels are also especially induced upon infection by the Xoo strain, PXO86. Depletion of endogenous SA can significantly attenuate plant resistance to PXO86, even to 86∆HrpXG (mutant PXO86 with a damaged type III secretion system). These results indicated that SA plays an important role in disease resistance in rice plants, which can be clouded by high levels of endogenous SA and the use of particular rice varieties. Bacterial blight (BB) caused by Xanthomonasoryzae pv. Oryzae (Xoo) is a serious bacterial disease in rice-growing areas and can reduce the rice yield by up to 50% in some areas of Asia 1. The most effective and economical management strategy for BB is the utilization of BB resistance genes in breeding. Of note, the rice-Xoo interaction has now become an important model system to study diseases in monocotyledonous plants 2. Approximately 44 rice bacterial blight resistance genes (BBR genes) have been identified to date 3,4. Of them, 10 genes, including Xa21,