Abstract: Transport density is an important factor affecting the water quality conditions, stress levels, and survival rates of fish. To investigate the differences on the antioxidant enzyme activity and transcriptional expression of liver tissues in Selenotoca multifasciata under different transport density conditions, according to the number of S. multifasciata, we designed four vehicle-transport groups (G3.5K, G5K, G6.5K, and G8K) and a pre-transport control group (G0K) based on vehicle transportation. Then we measured the survival rate, water quality, antioxidant enzyme activity of liver tissue, and other indicators for the experimental fish in each group. We also performed a transcriptome sequencing analysis on the liver tissues from the G3.5K and G8K experimental groups. The results show that the mortality rates of S. multifasciata fries increased along with transport density and duration, with survival rates of 100%, 99.34%, 97.80%, and 94.50% in the four transport groups in 3 h, respectively. The water quality indicators such as ammonia nitrogen, non-ionized ammonia, nitrite, and turbidity also increased along with transport duration, while pH values show an opposite trend. The antioxidant enzyme activity indicators such as superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT) activities showed an initial increase followed by a decrease with increasing transport density, while malondialdehyde (MDA) content increased with transport density. Differential gene expression analysis of transcriptomes identified 3 804 differentially expressed genes (DEGs), and the numbers of up-regulated and down-regulated DEGs were 2 389 and 1 415. GO and KEGG enrichment analysis indicate that many DEGs were involved in biological processes and pathways such as mRNA decay, oxidative phosphorylation, and ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation. It is recommended that the transportation density of S. multifasciata fries in the process of circulating water transportation should be controlled within 12 kg·m⁻³.