Tolerance represents the relative capacity of aquatic organisms to survive and reproduce under different levels of environmental stress. Tolerance values (TVs) of macroinvertebrates are broadly used for calculating metrics applied in bioassessment. Variability among TVs may be related to regional differences in macroinvertebrate sensitivity to pollution; whether the calculations and amendments of TVs are appropriate for one region is the basis for accurate evaluation of river health condition. Two methods, namely, expert opinion and statistical analysis, have been used to derive the TVs of macroinvertebrate taxa. The TVs currently used in bioassessment of northern rivers in China were acquired from relevant literature and expert opinion. The bioassessment results, however, will be more accurate if the TVs are derived from statistical analysis. The objective of the current study was to derive the TVs appropriate for macroinvertebrate taxa in northeastern rivers in China. Macroinvertebrate data from 308 samples were collected in spring and autumn in 2009 and summer in 2010 in the Liao River basin. Using the revised Simpson index, we assigned the water quality into five categories as: ≥ 10, excellent; ≥ 6, good; ≥ 3, good-fair; ≥ 2, fair; and < 2, poor. Different scores were marked to different water quality: excellent, 1; good, 2; good-fair, 3; fair, 4 and poor, 5. Macroinvertebrates were grouped and coded based on abundance at each site: < 1 ind./sample = 0; 1-2 ind./sample = 1; 3-9 ind./sample = 3; and ≥ 10 ind./sample = 10. The average abundance values for each taxon were calculated for each of the five water quality classes. The average abundance values were converted into a cumulative percentile: the 75^th percentile value was used for a taxon that had > 10 records and the 50^th percentile value was used for a taxon that had 5-10 records. This yielded preliminary tolerance values of 0.0-4.5, which were transformed to final tolerance values on a 0-10 scale. A total of 195 macroinvertebrate taxa TVs were calculated, including one genus in one family for each Megaloptera, Amphipoda, Decapoda, Basommatophora, Unionoida, Tubificida, Hirudinea, Turbellaria, and Arachnida; one family of Collembola; two families (including one taxon at genus-level) of Hemiptera; five genera in three families of Plecoptera; five genera in four families of Odonata; five genera in four families of Mesogastropoda; six families (including five taxa at genus-level) of Coleoptera; 13 genera in 10 families of Trichoptera; 17 genera in eight families of Ephemeroptera; and 18 genera and three sub-families in 12 families of Diptera. The other 71 TVs were derived from expert opinion and relevant literature. TVs were classified according to sensitivity as: TV ≤ 3, intolerant; 3 < TV < 7, intermediate; and TV ≥ 7, tolerant. The dominant macroinvertebrate families in the Liao River basin were divided into the three groups as follows: intolerant group, including Corydalidae (2.1), Perlidae (1.3-2.1), Rhyacophilidae (0.6-3.0), and Leptophlebiidae (0.4-1.7); intermediate group, including Hydropsychidae (3.7-5.3), Baetidae (3.4-6.2), and Planorbidae (3.7-5.5); and tolerant group, including Tubificidae (5.0-9.9) and Erpobdellidae (7.8-8.6). The intolerant and intermediate groups comprised nearly 84% of the total taxa, while the tolerant group comprised only 16% of the total taxa. We suggest that TVs can be used to assess the water quality of streams and rivers in northern China.