Abstract: Appropriate shape of rotor blade tip is of great importance to the axial fan performance. By considering a two-stage variable-pitch axial fan as an example, Fluent is used to simulate the performance of the fan under five different blade tip shapes. The internal dynamics, the pressure distribution, and the loss characteristics are analyzed in the present paper. Simulation results show that the five different blade tip shapes can improve the fan performance. The countercurrent-flow-grooved blade tip has the highest improvement in performance, followed by the double grooved blade tip, the up-step blade tip, and the down-step blade tip, while the current-flow-grooved blade tip only improves fan performance in relatively low flow rates. Due to the improvement of the blade tip shapes, the internal dynamics tends to be more complex. The improvement enhances the vorticity intensity and enlarges the domain of the leakage vortex, resulting in the appreciable reductions of the axial velocity and the leakage flow in the tip clearance. The total pressure and the efficiency are, respectively, improved by 4.68% and 0.94% for the countercurrent-flow-grooved blade tip at the design flow rate. In consideration of the current requirements of ultra-low emission renovation in coal-fired power plants, the blade tip with countercurrent-flow-groove is the best choice for the axial flow fan.