Reverse micelle extraction is still in the stage of laboratory. Major limitation associated with use of synthetic surfactants in reverse micelle extraction process is the unfolding or denaturation of proteins. Sugar surfactants are thought non-toxic and environmentally benign, and can exhibit interesting interfacial properties, but the application of sugar-based surfactants in protein extraction is still limited. In the present study, we extracted bovine serum albumin (BSA) by using reverse micelles from glucosylammonium (GA) and lactosylammonium (LA) surfactants (with dicarboxylate as counter ion). It was found that under optimum condition, (1) the maximum forward extraction efficiency was ca. 86% with GA, while only around 50% with LA, and (2) almost all BSA solubilized in reverse micelles prepared from GA could be recovered into aqueous phase, while the recovery of BSA from the reverse micelles of LA was lower. In addition, the optimum extraction parameters were closely related to surfactant structure. Therefore, the electrostatic interaction, H-bonding and sugar head size should be important for BSA transfer.