Abstract: Based on the daily precipitation records of 45 national weather stations in northern Xinjiang from 1961 to 2019,the characteristics of different levels of snowfall were analyzed by using statistical analysis method. The results showed that the number of snowfall days,snowfall amount,snowfall intensity and contribution of snowfall to annual precipitation increased with the rate of 0.41 d/10 a,3.13 mm/10 a,0.15(mm·d^-1)/10 a,and 1.3%/10 a in northern Xinjiang during 1961-2019,respectively. The number of snowfall days and the amount of snowfall were mainly increased by the moderate snow and heavy snow,and the snowfall intensity was mainly increased by blizzard intensity.The contribution of light snow to the number of snowfall days and the amount of snowfall showed a decreasing trend,the other levels showed an increasing trend,and the contribution of medium snow days and heavy snow amount were the most obvious. The number of snowfall days in January showed a decreasing trend in northern Xinjiang,which was mainly due to the significant decrease of light snowfall days. In winter,the number of snowfall days showed an increasing trend,which was mainly due to the significant increase of moderate and heavy snow. The highest number of snowfall days and snowfall was occurred in the 2000 s,and the fewer snowfall days was occurred in the 1960 s and the2010 s. The snowfall in northern Xinjiang changed abruptly in 1985,and the annual average snowfall increased by 12.4 mm after the change. Compared with poor snow year and rich snow year,more snow in rich snow year was mainly due to the increase of the number of snowfall days above light snow level.