Background. According to a report by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), lung cancer (LC) is among the leading causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide, with an estimated incidence of 14.1 million new cases of the disease and 8.2 million cancer deaths in 2012. Lung cancer is the most common cancer worldwide, accounting for 13 % of all new cancer cases and 19.4 % of deaths.The purpose of the study was to evaluate LC prevalence and to measure the quality of population-based cancer registries by the indices of the proportion of total incident cases.Material and methods. The study material was given from the monograph «Cancer on Five Continents», which included data from the database of the Cancer Registry of PA. Herzen Moscow Research Oncology Institute (St. Petersburg), surveys of morbidity and mortality in the North-West Federal District, estimations of proportion of the true incidence that was registered in population-based registries.Results. The analysis of lung cancer morbidity and mortality in Russia showed a significant improvement in analytical indices over the past 10 years, however, underestimation of primary cases, reduced the overall lung cancer incidence rate.Conclusions. The dynamics of age-specific lung cancer incidence was shown. The loss of primary lung cancer cases was estimated to be 15-20 % annually.