A molecular thermodynamic model was developed for describing the restricted swelling behavior of a thermosensitive hydrogel confined in a limited space. The Gibbs free energy includes two contributions, the contribution of mixing of polymer and solvent calculated by using the lattice model of random polymer solution, and the contribution due to the elasticity of polymer network. This model can accurately describe the swelling behavior of restricted hydrogels under uniaxial and biaxial constraints by using two model parameters. One is the interaction energy parameter between polymer network and solvent, and the other is the size parameter depending on the degree of cross-linking. The calculated results show that the swelling ratio reduces significantly and the phase transition temperature decreases slightly as the restricted degree increases, which agree well with the experimental data. (C) 2014 The Chemical Industry and Engineering Society of China, and Chemical Industry Press. All rights reserved.