The frequency of extreme heavy precipitation events over Hunan is increasing under the background of global warming. Based on the daily precipitation data collected from 88 stations over Hunan and NCEP reanalysis data during 1961-2016,the climate characteristics of regional persistent heavy rain and heavy rainfall pattern over Hunan were analyzed by using the abrupt change analysis,clustering analysis,composite analysis and so on. The results shows that the regional persistent heavy rain during the past 56-year over Hunan has occurred annual average 2 times,and the maximum number of consecutive days is 5. The percent of regional persistent heavy rain is 73% and 0% in summer and winter,and is 16%,38%,20% and 14% in May,June,July and August respectively. Annual regional persistent heavy rain process times changed from 1.4 in 1961-1992 to 2.8 in 1993-2016,and 1993 is the mutational year. The regional persistent heavy rain mainly occurred more than 0.9 times a year over the north of central Hunan,and the frequency of regional persistent heavy rain over north of central Hunan was significantly more than that over southern Hunan. The regional persistent heavy rain intensity averaged over Hunan is 82.5 mm·d~(-1),which is 7.7 mm·d~(-1) bigger than that of non-sustained regional heavy rain,and the stations of regional heavy rain intensity greater than 85 mm·d~(-1) are mainly distributed over northwest and southeast Hunan. The heavy rainfall can be divided into four spatial distribution pattern: northwestern, north-central,south-central and southeastern type,and the percent of the four heavy rainfall pattern days to the total heavy rainfall days is 25.6%,30.1%,21% and 18.4%,respectively. The precipitation intensity of the northwestern type and southeastern type was higher than that of the north-central type and south-central type,and the heavy rainfall area of the former two types was more concentrated. The location and direction of synthesis wind field shear and large value area of water vapor convergence on 925 hPa are basically consistent with the strong precipitation area of four heavy rainfall pattern over Hunan,which has a good indication for prediction about the heavy rainfall area over Hunan.