Abstract Purpose To investigate the computed tomography (CT) characteristics of air-containing space and its specific patterns in neoplastic and non-neoplastic ground glass nodules (GGNs) for clarifying their significance in differential diagnosis. Materials and methods From January 2015 to October 2022, 1328 patients with 1,350 neoplastic GGNs and 462 patients with 465 non-neoplastic GGNs were retrospectively enrolled. Their clinical and CT data were analyzed and compared with emphasis on revealing the differences of air-containing space and its specific patterns (air bronchogram and bubble-like lucency [BLL]) between neoplastic and non-neoplastic GGNs and their significance in differentiating them. Results Compared with patients with non-neoplastic GGNs, female was more common (P