One of the most effective strategies for avian hosts to defend against brood parasitism is to reject the parasitic egg from the focal nest. However, much of the variation in egg-rejection frequency between individuals remains unexplained. A precondition for egg ejection is recognizing the parasitic egg. Hosts may potentially improve recognition accuracy by augmenting inspection frequency and time to facilitate comparative assessment between foreign and conspecific eggs. In this study, we investigated the relationship between egg inspection and egg-rejection propensity in the Daurian redstarts Phoenicurus auroreus, a common host of the common cuckoo Cuculus canorus. After adding a foreign cuckoo egg model, redstarts spent longer time inspecting and inspected it more often. Moreover, females more frequently and spent more time inspected it when inspecting the parasitic egg were more likely to recognize the foreign egg. Our results thus demonstrate that the inspect eggs facilitates the host’s ability to recognize the foreign egg. Keywords: Cuckoo parasitism, Daurian redstart, egg inspection, egg recognition, egg rejection