A model, including segregation from silicon melt to silicon crystal as well as evaporation from silicon melt to Ar atmosphere, was established for simulating the oxygen distribution in multicrystalline silicon (mc-si) ingot, which shows good agreement with the experimental results. According to this model, the oxygen distribution in the bottom of ingot is mainly determined by the evaporation of oxygen, whereas that in the top of ingot is dominated by the segregation of oxygen. Furthermore, it could be found that the O-i profiles in growth direction of ingots become more and more steeper with the increase of the exponent X. (C) 2007 Published by Elsevier B.V.