Based on seasonal and annual precipitation data from 73 meteorological stations during 1961—2009 in Hebei province and its vicinity,the spatial and temporal characteristics of drought are analyzed by the precipitation Z index,empirical orthogonal function and Morlet wavelet analysis method.The results show that uniform drought/flood is the most common pattern for the distribution of seasonal and annual drought in Hebei.The second pattern is a seesaw between southern and northern region,including flood in south with drought in north,and drought in south with flood in north.The emergence of seasonal and annual drought has obvious inter-decadal changes as well as significant inter-annual changes.In the recent 49 years,annual drought index in Hebei presented a downward trend.An abrupt change of annual drought index emerged after 1979 and the climate in the province has entered into dry period since then.