AbstractThe aim of this work is to offer sufficient conditions for the oscillation of neutral differential equation second order
$$ \bigl( r ( t ) \bigl[ \bigl( y ( t ) +p ( t ) y \bigl( \tau ( t ) \bigr) \bigr) ^{\prime } \bigr] ^{\gamma } \bigr) ^{\prime }+f \bigl( t,y \bigl( \sigma ( t ) \bigr) \bigr) =0, $$(r(t)[(y(t)+p(t)y(τ(t)))′]γ)′+f(t,y(σ(t)))=0, where $\int ^{\infty }r^{-1/\gamma } ( s ) \,\mathrm{d}s= \infty $∫∞r−1/γ(s)ds=∞. Based on the comparison with first order delay equations and by employ the Riccati substitution technique, we improve and complement a number of well-known results. Some examples are provided to show the importance of these results.