Using aldehydes with different substituents of the aryl groups, we have synthesized a series of asymmetric porphyrins containing an 8-ethoxycarbonyl-1-naphthyl group by one-pot reactions. Our studies suggest the steric property of substituents is the major factor to affect the reaction yields, the steric hindrance is unfavorable for such reaction. Compared with those para-substituted species, NMR studies of 2,6-substituted species show upfield shifts for their NH and ethyl protons, downfield shifts for their pyrrole protons, which is probably due to the decrease of porphyrin ring current. Three of them have been characterized by X-ray crystallography. Structures show that the ester group is hanging over the porphyrin plane, compound 3 and 4 have much different core conformations from compound 2, which is probably due to the π–π interactions in the solid state.