High density polyethylene (HDPE) was molded by a new polymer processing method, that is, water-assisted injection molding (WAIM), and its hierarchical structure was studied by two-dimensional small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS). For comparison, the hierarchical structure of HDPE molded by conventional injection molding (CIM) was also characterized. The result shows that the WAIM part exhibits a distinct skin-core-water channel structure which is different from the skin-core structure for the CIM part. In the skin layer of both WAIM and CIM parts, the shish-kebab structure was formed due to the shear stress brought by melt filling, but the lamellar orientation parameter of CIM part is smaller than that of WAIM part. The spherulites with random lamellar orientation are dominant at the core of both parts owing to the low cooling rate and feeble shear stress therein. Interestingly, the shish structure and the lamellae with low level of orientation can be found at the water channel layer of WAIM part. They are attributed to the shear stress brought by water penetration. Moreover, the lamellar orientation parameter in water channel layer is smaller than that of skin layer. In addition, the long period of WAIM part first increases and then decreases with the elevating distance from the skin surface, while that of CIM part tends to increase monotonously. In a word, one can conclude that the rapid cooling rate and shear brought by the injected water have significant influence on the structural evolution for the WAIM part. (c) 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2012