GeTe films have been showed great applications in the field of optical devices, especially in infrared absorption due to their narrow band gap. In this paper, amorphous GeTe (a-GeTe) film was prepared by pulsed laser deposition. Then, crystalline GeTe (c-GeTe) film was obtained by annealed in a tubular furnace at 200 °C. The X-ray diffraction indicates that GeTe film is transferred from amorphous to crystalline phase after annealing. The X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy shows that the presence of Ge and Te elements corresponding to the structure of GeTe. The high resolution transmission electron microscope also indicates that the disordered structure of GeTe film is transferred into ordered. Compared with a-GeTe film, the optical property of c-GeTe film has higher absorbance at 0.94 on 1100 nm measured by UV–Vis–NIR absorption spectroscopy. According to the calculation results, the optical band gaps of c-GeTe film and a-GeTe film are 0.82 eV and 0.87 eV respectively, indicating that the c-GeTe films is more favorable for photon transition. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy also confirms that the infrared absorption properties of c-GeTe films is superior to those of the a-GeTe film. These results provide a fundamental research for the application of c-GeTe film in the field of infrared absorption. • PLD achieved the growth of a-GeTe films on the Si substrate. • The structure of GeTe film achieved amorphous to crystalline phase transition by annealing. • C-GeTe film is more suitable for infrared absorption compared with a-GeTe film. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]