An accurate prediction of gas-liquid interfacial area is very important for the design and optimization of column trays. However, the difference of the gas-liquid flow regimes operating at different scale trays significantly affect the interfacial area calculation. Therefore, in this study, an interfacial area model operating at small column was established using the Kolmogorov's isotropic turbulence hypothesis. According to the analyzes of the gas-liquid flow phenomena of different scale columns, an assumption that the similarity principle of flow characteristics of gas-liquid in full contact was proposed. Moreover, a new model that can be used to predict the gas-liquid interfacial area of a large column with exiting the nonideal flow was obtained through the extension of the small tray interfacial area model based on this principle. Finally, the new model was tested by comparisons with the experimental results of references. The prediction accuracy significantly improved with the maximum deviation of approximately 40%. (c) 2015 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 62: 905-915, 2016