Aiming at the robust control problem of disturbed systems that contain uncertain parameters, a novel control scheme termed adaptive barrier sliding-mode control (ABSMC) is presented. The proposed ABSMC contains an adaptive switching gain based on the barrier function along with a state-dependent assumption of the lumped uncertainty. Distinguished from existing similar works, the obvious advantage of the proposed scheme is that ABSMC enables convergence of the system trajectory and holds it within a predefined vicinity of the sliding surface independent of the lumped uncertainty, without control gain overestimation. Moreover, the conventionally adopted priori constant boundedness assumption of the lumped uncertainty is replaced by a more reasonable state-dependent assumption. The stability analysis of the controlled system is carried out through Lyapunov theorem. The performance improvement of the proposed scheme is validated through comparative simulation.