Objective In order to mitigate the corrosion of methanol gasoline. Methods Commonly used metal materials such as copper, brass, iron, steel and aluminum in the automotive oil system were studied as the objects. A method combining degree of metal corrosion and color change was developed to determine corrosion performance of methanol gasoline. The corrosion effects of metal slice immersed in methanol gasoline with different contents, water-added methanol gasoline and inhibitor-added methanol gasoline were investigated. Main reasons for corrosion in methanol gasoline were analyzed. Corrosion inhibitor was screened according to corrosion mechanism. Results Low proportional methanol gasoline had obvious corrosion effect on all kinds of metal materials. Compared with 93# gasoline, addition of 5% methanol would double the degree of corrosion for copper, brass, iron, steel and aluminum. Adding small amounts of water would exacerbate corrosion of methanol gasoline. But when the water content reached a certain level, the degree of corrosion became less. Inhibitor B had a good corrosion inhibition effect on copper-based metal material, while inhibitor C had a good corrosion inhibition effect on iron-based metal material. Combined inhibitor H had a good corrosion inhibition effect on all selected metal materials, which could reduce the corrosion rates of copper, brass, iron and aluminum by 82.1%, 81.5%, 85.3% and 89.5% respectively. Conclusion Combined inhibitor can effectively reduce the corrosion of methanol gasoline on metal materials.