A dispersion compensation design system includes a changing unit setting a changed value for the amount of dispersion compensation for a span connecting nodes constituting an optical network; a path classification unit determining whether respective paths in the optical network are capable of transmission with the changed value and classifying one or more of the paths as second category paths based on the determination results; an updating unit updating the amount of dispersion compensation with the changed value if the number of the second category paths in the latest classification result is less than the number of the second category paths in the retained previous classification result; and a repeating unit that, if not all of the paths in the optical network are capable of transmission, prevents use of combinations of amounts of dispersion compensation applied to the spans in the second category paths in the latest classification result.