A method for manufacturing a transparent electrode with a low surface roughness, in particular a method for preparing a large-area, low-cost and patterned transparent electrode using the screen-printing technology, which focuses on solving the problem of a high roughness of a screen-printed pattern. First, a substrate is coated with a layer of a smooth conductive material, then screen printing is performed to obtain a conductive pattern, and finally, a layer of a surfactant-modified composite conductive material is applied and film transfer printing is performed to obtain a transparent electrode with a low surface roughness. The transparent electrode prepared by the method retains a smooth surface of the original substrate after peeling, which has a remarkably low surface roughness and a significantly increased success rate of film transfer printing, and can be directly applied to various photoelectric devices, such as solar batteries, LEDs, flat panel displays and electronic sensors.