Two new triphenylamine-based starburst dyes (WD-2 and WD-3) are designed, in which the carbazole/phenothiazine groups are used as secondary electron donor and the rhodanine-3-acetic acid moiety as the acceptor. We report the synthesis, photophysical and electrochemical properties of the dyes as well as their applications in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). Under standard global AM 1.5 solar condition, the WD-2 sensitized cell gives a short circuit photocurrent density J sc =6.4mAcm −2 , an open circuit voltage V oc =600mV, a fill factor ff=0.8, corresponding to an overall conversion efficiency of 3.1%. Under the same conditions, the WD-3 sensitized cell gives J sc =4.7mAcm −2 , V oc =570mV, and ff=0.78, corresponding to an overall conversion efficiency of 2.1%. The conversion efficiency is increased about 47% from WD-2 sensitized cell to WD-3 sensitized cell. The research results show that the inefficient electron injection from the excited dyes into the conduction band of TiO 2 results in the low efficiencies of DSSCs based on the two dyes.