Abstract: Enhancing water ecological resilience during the urbanization process is crucial for achieving harmonious coexistence between humans and nature.The urban panel data from 1997 to 2023 were used in this study.An improved double machine learning method was employed to conduct an empirical analysis on the impact of new urbanization in the Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB) on water ecological resilience.The results showed that the estimated coefficient of the comprehensive pilot policy for new urbanization was 0072, which was significant at the 5% level.That implied that the comprehensive pilot program for new urbanization was conducive to improving the water ecological resilience of pilot cities along the YREB.This conclusion remained valid after a series of robustness tests.Heterogeneity analysis indicated that the positive effect of the comprehensive pilot program for new urbanization on the water ecological resilience of pilot cities passed the significance test in the upper and middle reaches of the YREB and in regions with high and medium levels of environmental regulation, and was most pronounced in regions with low water ecological resilience.The mediation mechanism test revealed that the comprehensive pilot program for new urbanization promoted the improvement of water ecological resilience of pilot cities along the YREB through the effects of factor agglomeration, technological progress, human capital, industrial structure, and marketization