Smart growth is an urban planning theory that originated in 1990’s, which has been gradually focused on by researchers. The theory is in coincidence with China’s strategies that promote urbanization and the transformation of urban development. The goal of this paper is to apply analytic hierarchy process to build an evaluation system of cities based on smart growth. After analyzing the factors that need to be taken into account, we build a hierarchical model and put different weight on different factors that compose the evaluation system of cities. Finally, we use smart growth mode for Jinchang city and point out that the scientific urban planning should be improved in the way of smart growth. The results of this paper can provide some decision-making references for relevant departments.