BackgroundSeveral studies have focused on the relationship between MMP-8 variants and cancer risk, but they have been unsuccessful in drawing reliable conclusions.MethodsWe employed odds ratio (OR) together with 95% confidence interval (CI) to assess the correlation between MMP-8 C-799 T, Lys460Thr, and Lys87Glu polymorphisms and cancer risk. We further employed in silico tools to evaluate the effect of MMP-8 expression on cancer susceptibility and overall survival time.ResultsA total of 8140 patients with malignant carcinoma and 10,529 healthy individuals (control) were enrolled. Overall, the analysis showed that the relationship between three MMP-8 variants and cancer susceptibility was not significant (allelic contrast, C-799 T: OR = 0.98, 95% CI = 0.92–1.04, Pheterogeneity = 0.068; Lys460Thr: OR = 0.94, 95% CI = 0.67–1.32, Pheterogeneity = 0.905; Lys87Glu: OR = 1.05, 95% CI = 0.93–1.18, Pheterogeneity = 0.968). Similar results were observed in subgroup analysis by ethnicity, cancer type, and source of control. In silico analysis indicated that MMP-8 expression was elevated in bladder cancer tissue compared to that in the control. However, both the higher and lower MMP-8 expression groups did not show an impact on the overall survival time of the patients.ConclusionsMMP-8 C-799 T, Lys460Thr, and Lys87Glu variants are not participant with the susceptibility of cancer.