BACKGROUND: To determine clinical or imaging prognostic features for visual outcome in eyes with submacular hemorrhage secondary to age-related macular degeneration (AMD) or polypoidal choroidal vasculopathy (PCV). METHODS: A prospective case series of 11 eyes from 11 patients with submacular hemorrhage secondary to AMD or PCV. All participants had measurement of clinical characteristics, fundus angiogram, and indocyanine green angiography, spectral domain optical coherence tomography (OCT, Cirrus, Zeiss) at baseline and 6 months. RESULTS: Median visual acuity improved from 20/132 to 20/63 at month 6. The median improvement in vision was 0.20 LogMAR units. Proportion of eyes with best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA) ≥ 1.0 increased from 6/11 (54.5 %) at baseline to 8/11 (72.7 %) at month 6. Eyes with BCVA > 1.0 were more likely to have larger area of hemorrhage and thinner subfoveal neurosensory retinal thickness at baseline and at month 6. CONCLUSIONS: Thinner neurosensory retina demonstrated on OCT at baseline may be a useful prognostic sign for limited visual recovery.