Chitin was isolated from crab shells by modified Hackman's method, which was treated again with aqueous sodium hydroxide solution to give alkali chitin(sodium alkoxide of chitin). And after, the alkali chitin is allowed to react with monochloroacetic acid to synthesize 6-O-(carboxymethyl) chitin [CM-Chitin] under diminished pressure. In order to synthesize high performance CM-Chitin as hygroscopic agent, it was measured that the yield and degree of subsititution of each CM-Chitin according to molar ratio(monochloroacetic acid equivalent mol/N-acetyl-D-glucosamine residue) and their moisture-absorption and moisture-release properties were measured and compared with those of hyaluronic acid. The moisture-absorption and moisture-release properties of CM-Chitin, especially 0.8 in degree of substitution, were found quite similar to those of hyaluronic acid. The preliminary results show that CM-Chitin might be used as hygroscopic agent instead of hyaluronic acid in field of cosmetics.