Objective To observe the characteristics of patients in post anesthesia care unit (PACU) undergoing ambulatory surgery and traditional inpatient surgery after general anesthesia. Methods Retrospective review of 28 946 patients who underwent general anesthesia and recovered in PACU at Xinagya Hospital of Central South University from September 2018 to September 2019. According to the ward, these patients were divided into ambulatory surgery group (group A, 3 032) and traditional inpatient surgery group (group C, 25 914). Group A were matched with group C using a propensity score matching (PSM) method at a 1∶1 ratio. The general information, surgical and PACU characteristics between the two groups of patients were compared before and after matching. Results Before PSM, there was no difference in gender distribution between the two groups (P=0.613). Compared with group C, patients in group A were younger with lower preoperative ASA stage and shorter operation time, anesthesia time, observation time before tracheal extubation, PACU time, and longer observation time after tracheal extubation (P<0.001). After matching the two groups of patients according to gender, age, ASA stage, surgical time and anesthesia time, the observation time before tracheal extubation and PACU time in group A were shorter, and the observation time after tracheal extubation was longer (P<0.001). Conclusions Compared with traditional inpatient surgery, the observation time before extubation and PACU time in patients undergoing ambulatory surgery were shorter, but the observation time after extubation was longer.