Global open DEM datasets provide important data sources for digital topographic analysis. Compared to the existing global open DEM datasets, the DEM data made from ZY-3 Satellite have higher spatial resolution, wider coverage and better currency, which results to a great likelihood to produce a global DEM dataset with high quality from ZY-3 Satellite. So the error comparison among the DEM datasets made from ZY-3 Satellite and the global open datasets will provide scientific basis for the global DEM dataset production made form ZY-3 Satellite data. Taking the Taiyuan City (the middle region of Shanxi Province) as a test area, this paper made an error comparison among the DEM datasets made from ZY-3 Satellite (ZY-3 Satellite DEM) and three typical global open DEM datasets (AW3D30, SRTM1 and ASTER GDEM) based on the referencing DEM data produced by laser-point cloud data with high accuracy. Meanwhile, the mean value, mean absolute value, root mean square value and standard deviation value are computed for the absolute error and the relative error at different slope classes. The research results show: (1) the error distributions for all of the four DEM datasets show relatively good symmetry. Meanwhile, the mean error value is approximate to 0 m, especially for the SRTM1 and ASTER GDEM data. So the root mean square error values and the standard deviation error values are approximate for all the four DEM datasets. (2) ZY-3 Satellite DEM has the lowest root mean square error value (4.6 m), so it has the highest accuracy. The next is the AW3D30 data (with root mean square error value of 5.6 m), then the SRTM1 data (with root mean square error value of 8.8 m). ASTER GDEM has the highest error values (with root mean square error value of 12.6 m), so it has the lowest accuracy. Meanwhile, the relative error and the absolute error show similar rules for the four DEM datasets. (3) The errors of the ZY-3 Satellite DEM, SRTM1 and ASTER GDEM data rise with slope increasing. The error of AW3D30 data shows an undulation tendency of rising first, and then falling with slope increasing. The error for the AW3D30 data is lower than that for the SRTM1 data at any slope classes except for the 0°~2° class. At all the slope classes, ASTER GDEM data has the highest error values of all. Overall, compared to other three DEM datasets, ZY-3 Satellite DEM data has the lowest error values and the highest accuracy at all the slope classes.