diff --git a/python/paddle/fluid/tests/unittests/test_cross_entropy_loss.py b/python/paddle/fluid/tests/unittests/test_cross_entropy_loss.py
index 897d76a35dcabfc5b39c9cfadd123e4ad4c27b6f..a89d47d351d0087ac351561a138ac5db9e26e169 100644
--- a/python/paddle/fluid/tests/unittests/test_cross_entropy_loss.py
+++ b/python/paddle/fluid/tests/unittests/test_cross_entropy_loss.py
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@ import numpy as np
 import unittest
 from test_softmax_op import stable_softmax
 from test_softmax_with_cross_entropy_op import cross_entropy
+from paddle.fluid import Program, program_guard
 
 
 def stable_softmax(x):
@@ -1363,5 +1364,37 @@ class CrossEntropyLoss(unittest.TestCase):
         self.assertTrue(np.allclose(dy_ret_value, expected))
 
 
+class TestCrossEntropyFAPIError(unittest.TestCase):
+    def test_errors(self):
+        with program_guard(Program(), Program()):
+
+            def test_LabelValue():
+                input_data = paddle.rand(shape=[20, 100])
+                label_data = paddle.randint(
+                    0, 100, shape=[20, 1], dtype="int64")
+                label_data[0] = 255
+                weight_data = paddle.rand([100])
+                paddle.nn.functional.cross_entropy(
+                    input=input_data,
+                    label=label_data,
+                    weight=weight_data,
+                    ignore_index=255)
+
+            self.assertRaises(ValueError, test_LabelValue)
+
+            def test_LabelValueNeg():
+                input_data = paddle.rand(shape=[20, 100])
+                label_data = paddle.randint(
+                    0, 100, shape=[20, 1], dtype="int64")
+                label_data[0] = -1
+                weight_data = paddle.rand([100])
+                paddle.nn.functional.cross_entropy(
+                    input=input_data,
+                    label=label_data,
+                    weight=weight_data,
+                    ignore_index=-1)
+
+            self.assertRaises(ValueError, test_LabelValueNeg)
+
 if __name__ == "__main__":
     unittest.main()
diff --git a/python/paddle/nn/functional/loss.py b/python/paddle/nn/functional/loss.py
index aa0bd8a8c5e3d5dcae7c26018d28ce93637947bd..eeb00625876468fac7ce3d1ebefd4b46a796d2c0 100755
--- a/python/paddle/nn/functional/loss.py
+++ b/python/paddle/nn/functional/loss.py
@@ -1411,6 +1411,13 @@ def cross_entropy(input,
                 out = core.ops.elementwise_mul(out, weight_gather_reshape)
 
             else:
+                label_min = paddle.min(label)
+                label_max = paddle.max(label)
+                if label_min < 0 or label_max >= input.shape[-1]:
+                    raise ValueError(
+                        'Expected 0 <= label_value < class_dimension({}), but got {} <= label_value <= {} '.
+                        format(input.shape[-1],
+                               label_min.numpy(), label_max.numpy()))
                 weight_gather = core.ops.gather_nd(weight, label)
                 input_shape = list(label.shape)
                 weight_gather_reshape = reshape(