BACKGROUND: Measuring nursing care quality is essential for nursing practice. However, because of its complexity, such a quality is difficult to define and measure appropriately and a review of available instruments to measure this is important. AIM: This systematic review reports on contemporary quantitative instruments for evaluating nursing care quality and suggests some directions for further study. METHOD: A comprehensive search was conducted in 2015 to review five databases CINAHL, HINARI, ScienceDirect, Google and PubMed, and 18 articles met the inclusion criteria. The search covered the earliest literature found up until November 2015. RESULT: We found that instruments could be categorized from three different measuring perspectives (1) nurses, (2) patients and (3) both nurses and patients. LIMITATION: First, only English language literature was sought and only five databases were reviewed. Second, the instruments reviewed are of varying dimensions. Finally, some authors did not provide the psychometric properties of the instruments studied. CONCLUSION: Many reviews published in peer-reviewed journals have serious methodological flaws that focus on different perspectives in relation to instruments to measure nursing care quality. As the result of this systematic review instruments are focused on different perspectives of nursing care quality for nurse managers. In addition, the findings of this systematic review enhance better understanding of the perspectives in regard to both nurses and patients in the health-care facilities. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING AND HEALTH POLICY: The results of this systematic review contribute to the ability of nurse managers to improve and consider the measurement of nursing care quality in clinical practice. The first suggests the need to understand the different perceptions of both nurses and patients' instruments regarding NCQ. Also, a health-care quality-related policy should also be formulated to reduce adverse events. The recording system policy must be designed appropriately in order to monitor patient outcomes every year