The invention discloses a paddle steamer. The paddle steamer comprises a boat body and a ship power device arranged on the boat body and composed of a host-driven propeller, wherein the propeller consists of two paddle wheels symmetrically arranged on the two sides of the boat body; and the lower edges of the paddle wheels are lower than the bottom surface of the boat body. The invention has the advantages that the modern host is combined with the traditional paddle wheels; the installation mode that the lower edges of the paddle wheels symmetrically arranged on the two sides of the boat body are lower than the bottom surface of the boat body is adopted, thus when the paddle wheels rotate at high speed, blades which are evenly distributed on the outer edges of the paddle wheels in the radial direction continuously and fast flap water surface backward and downward in turn; and as the density of water is high, enough forward and upward reacting force can be obtained, the upward component force supports the boat body to leap out of water, and the forward component force pushes the boat body to move forward. Therefore, only the tail of the boat body contacts a little part of water surface and slides on water surface and the balance of the boat body is maintained, thus avoiding extremely large water resistance, remarkably increasing the propelling efficiency and realizing the high-speed and economic navigation of ships.