Abstract: To solve the economic shortcomings of and improve the location accuracy of fault location methods employing micro-phasor measurement unit（μPMU）, a novel fault location method based on node voltage difference value is proposed. By analyzing the fault characteristics of node voltages for the distribution network, an indicator W is defined as the difference value between the calculated values and measured values of node voltage. Then, according to the numerical relationship between the calculated voltage values and the measured voltage values, a fault branch identification principle is established with limited measurement devices for the distribution network. From the measurement data at the terminals of fault branches and the numerical relationship between the change value of line node voltage and the change value of node measured voltage, a fault location method is proposed based on node voltage difference value. Simulation results show that the proposed method can locate fault points effectively. It has low sensitivity to fault types, grounding resistances and measurement errors, and good robustness to the changes of line parameters and node load.