Abstract: Based on the precipitation data from 2008 to 2013 in China, the characteristics of heavy rain including its distribution, variation and trend is investigated.The results show that the annual precipitation increases from northwest China to southeast China.Heavy rain usually happens in the east part of southwest China, Jianghan area, Jianghuai area, Jiangnan area and south China, especially the south part of south China, such as Hainan, where the annual heavy rain days are always beyond 10 d.The annual heay rain days in China are about 217.5 d, with most in June to August.Averagely, there are 39 heavy rain processes happened in China each year, and 8 of them are related with landing of tropic cyclone.Many heavy rain pocesses (about 58%) happen in June to August especially in July.There are 26 extreme heavy rain events for each year in average, with most of them in south China.The maximum daily precipitation in each year is in a range of 336.1~614.7 mm, uaually happened in June to October.According to the intensity and area of rainfall and its damage, the 10 high impact heavy rain events are selected.These heavy rain events happen in May to November, and most of them happen in south China.