Soil pollution of heavy metals is very severe in China, especially the cadmium pollution. Excessive cadmium not only causes severe damage to the growth and development of plants, leading to disorders of their physiological functions, reduced photosynthesis, and reduced organic matter accumulation and so on, but also greatly endangers human health. In this research, the growth of roots and the content of chlorophyll in the seedlings of wheat (Triticum aestivum L. cv. Longchun 27) were analyzed after being pretreated with exogenous salicylic acid (SA), nitric oxide (NO) scavenger (Carboxy-PTIO, c-PTIO), NO donor sodium nitratol (SNP), nitrate reductase (NR) inhibitor (Tungstate), NO synthase inhibitor (L-NAME) and then being treated with 100 μmol/L CdCl₂, to explore the mitigation mechanism of SA and NO interaction on Cd-induced phytotoxicity. The results showed that with the prolongation of cadmium treatment time, the content of SA decreased gradually, when the treatment time was extended to 24h, the SA content no longer changed, but the content of NO increased firstly (6 h and 12 h), then decreased (24 h and 48 h) in the roots of wheat seedlings. Cd stress significantly inhibited the root growth and reduced the chlorophyll content of the leaves. However, pretreatment with suitable SA or SNP could moderate the inhibition of Cd stress on the growth of roots and increase the content of chlorophyll in wheat seedlings. The single pretreatment of c-PTIO, L-NAME and Tungstate restrained the growth of roots significantly and reduced the content of NO, but had little effect on the content of chlorophyll. The pretreatment of SA400+L-NAME could alleviate the inhibition of root elongation and the reduction of chlorophyll as well as NO content in wheat seedlings were induced by Cd stress; the pretreatment SA400+c-PTIO or SA400+Tungstate could augment the content of chlorophyll, but there was no effect on root elongation under Cd stress. Further studies showed that Cd stress significantly weaken NR activity, while the pretreatment of SA400 could increase the NR activity of wheat seedlings roots under Cd stress; NOS activity was not affected by different treatments. In summary, Cd stress caused the decrease of endogenous SA content and the first increase of NO content and then decrease of wheat seedlings; the pretreatment with exogenous SA or SNP reduced the inhibition of root growth and the decrease of chlorophyll content by Cd stress; exogenous SA improved the tolerance of wheat seedlings to Cd stress by affecting the production of NO, ultimately, the phytotoxic effects of Cd on wheat seedlings were alleviated.