The invention discloses a preparation method of a p-aminophenylacetic acid, which comprises the following steps of: adding p-nitrophenylacetic acid, ethanol and a catalyst into a pressure reaction kettle in a certain proportion, replacing air in the reaction kettle with nitrogen, feeding hydrogen into the reaction kettle, and controlling a certain pressure and temperature; after the reaction is performed for a period of time, standing the reaction kettle, cooling the obtained product to room temperature, opening the pressure reaction kettle, and extracting 60-80% solvent ethanol through evaporating; carrying out cooling crystallization, filtration and drying on the solvent ethanol so as to obtain a coarse product, and carrying out recrystallization on the coarse product by using ethanol, and carrying out active carbon decoloration on the obtained product so as to obtain white crystalline p-aminophenylacetic acid, wherein the mass ratio of the p-nitrophenylacetic acid, the ethanol to the catalyst is 1:10: (0.02-0.05), the mass concentration of the ethanol is 95%, the mass concentration of the catalyst is 3-8% Pd/attapulgite clay, the reaction pressure is 0.4-0.6 MP, the reaction time is 3-5 hours, and the reaction temperature is 30-60 DEG C. According to the invention, the catalyst is low in cost, less in application amount and convenient for recycling; the method is mild in reaction conditions, energy-saving and environment-friendly; the method is good in reaction selectivity, less in side effects, easy to realize purification, and high in yield; and through taking hydrogen as a raw material, the method is less in pollution, simple in post-processing, and low in production cost.