In this paper, we study the robust fault detection problem of nonlinear systems. Based on the Lyapunov method,a robust fault detection approach for a general class of nonlinear systems is proposed. A nonlinear observer is first provided,and a sufficient condition is given to make the observer locally stable. Then, a practical algorithm is presented to facilitate the realization of the proposed observer for robust fault detection. Finally, a numerical example is provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed approach.