Staging is of great importance for planning liver cancer treatment. Liver cancers are generally divided into four main stages:

Stage 1: The cancer is limited to a single tumor within the liver and has not spread to blood vessels or other organs.

Stage 2: The cancer presents as multiple small tumors within the liver or a single tumor has begun to grow into blood vessels.

Stage 3: The cancer is characterized by multiple large tumors within the liver, or a single large tumor has invaded a major blood vessel.

Stage 4: The cancer has metastasized (spread) to distant organs or tissues outside the liver.