Snow as a land-cover type that is mainly distributed at the high latitude and high altitude regions.Snowfall,as are main precipitation type in mountainous areas,presents significant temporal and spatial difference which was affected by climate change.In this study,based on APHRO's dataset and temperature threshold model to analyze snowfall changes in the Tianshan Mountains during 1961-2015.Results indicated that:1) Temperature showed increasing trend in the Tianshan Mountains since 1961,with a rate of 0.027℃/a.And temperature increase rate in winter was higher than that in summer.Meanwhile,the average air temperature of elevation above 3 000 m is rise to around 0℃ during 1961-2015.2) Precipitation exhibited significant increasing with a rate of 0.42 mm/a (P<0.01) in winter,while decrease in spring and summer.3) Snowfall changes were characterized by temporal and spatial variations.Snowfall presented positive relationship with air temperature in the regions with elevation over 3 000 m,while negative relationship in regions with elevation below 3 000 m.4) Maximum snowfall temperature is a key factor to understanding changes of snowfall under warming.When mean temperature is below/above maximum snowfall temperature,snowfall usually increases/decreases with increased warming.Therefore,study on the snowfall variations in mountainous areas can be very helpful to understand the effects of climate change on hydrology process in mountainous areas.