Abstract: Analyzing urban land development intensity from the perspective of spatial effects can provides a new reference for optimizing the development and utilization of urban land resources. Based on the spatial pane data of 108 cities in the Yangtze River Economic Belt from 2003 to 2017, a comprehensive application of kernel density estimation and spatial autocorrelation methods were used to characterize and identify the spatial and temporal pattern of urban land development intensity in the Yangtze River Economic Belt. By constructing the economic geographic spatial weight matrix, the spatial panel Durbin model and its partial differential decomposition methods were used to analyze the spatial spillover of urban land development intensity in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.The results indicated that:(1) During the study period, the intensity of urban land development in the Yangtze River Economic Belt continued to increase, and inter-city differences continued to expand, accompanied by polarization. (2) The spatial distribution of urban land development intensity in the Yangtze River Economic Belt is not random, but there is a significant positive global spatial autocorrelation. The local spatial pattern is mainly HH and LL, supplemented by LH and HL. (3) The urban land development intensity of the Yangtze River Economic Belt has a significant positive space spillover effect, that is, the local urban land development intensity will drive the neighboring urban land development intensity. (4) Economic development, population urbanization, secondary industry, urban transportation, and real estate investment have a positive direct effect on local cities; economic development, population urbanization, and secondary industry have a negative spillover effect on neighboring cities. urban transportation have a positive spillover effect on neighboring cities.