Emerging evidences show RNA back-splicing produces a new type of noncoding RNA, namely circular RNA (circRNA). Many reports demonstrate that circRNA circHIPK3 exerts oncogenic or anti-tumor roles in different cancers, such as ovarian cancer, bladder cancer, osteosarcoma, colorectal cancer and liver cancer. However, no study about circHIPK3 function in glioma exists until today. In this study, we showed that circHIPK3 was upregulated in glioma tissues. Elevated level of circHIPK3 was linked to poor prognosis. Functional investigation indicated that circHIPK3 promotes glioma cell proliferation and invasion, and tumor propagation in vivo. Furthermore, miR-654 was identified as a target of circHIPK3 while IGF2BP3 was targeted by miR-654. CircHIPK3 could promote 1GF2BP3 expression via interacting with miR-654 in glioma cells. Finally, CCKB and transwell assays illustrated that IGF2BP3 overexpression could reverse the effects of IGF2BP3 depletion. Altogether, our findings demonstrated that circHIPK3 contributes to glioma progression through targeting miR-654 from IGF2BP3 and implies circHIPK3 might be a potential target for glioma therapy. (C) 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.