The progressive addition lenses have been used widely applied, because its advantages can meet the requirements of distant and near vision at both time. The basic structure, design and evaluation method of progressive addition lenses are introduced in this paper. The relationship between surface error and optical power of progressive addition lenses is analyzed. The relationship equations are derived from the surface equation and sphere equation. Based on the national glasses fabrication standard that the difference between practical optical power and nominal designed value should be less than 0.1D during the lens effective area, A progressive addition lenses example with 2.0D addition (6.0D~8.0D) was designed, evaluated and surface error tolerance analyzed. After fabrication with given surface error, the optical power difference is calculated correspondingly. It is shown that the simulation result is consistent with the solution of relationship equations. The relationship model provides theoretical basis for the surface precision during lens fabrication process.