A study on the weight reduction of a motor shaft in electric vehicle by using optimum design technique was carried out. The structural analysis of a motor shaft was performed by using ANSYS to investigate the structural safety. We also used HEEDS to find the optimal hollow shaft thickness. When the material of the hollow shaft is changed to SCM822H by using ANSYS 14.5 and HEEDS MDO, the weight could be reduced by about 53 % compared to the conventional solid one. From this study, the optimized dimensions of a hollow shaft were determined for light weight design.