Abstract: This study used the hourly precipitation data of 78 automatic weather stations (AWSs) in Shenzhen with more than 95%data availability from 2008 to 2017.The missing and abnormal data for the AWSs were first replaced or corrected by the nearest several sites which are at the same side relative to a mountain area. Based on these available and corrected data, the temporal and spatial characteristics of the monthly and yearly rainfall were explored. Furthermore, the variation of the daily rainfall was investigated by using the hourly data of Shenzhen National Basic Station. The results showed that: the annual mean precipitation in Shenzhen was 1863.9 mm from 2008 to 2017. During the past 10 years, the yearly precipitation in most of the administrative districts in Shenzhen was slightly increasing. The rainy days were slightly increasing too. However, these two increasing trends were not significant at 5% level. The monthly rainfall distribution in a year was not even, with the maximum rainfall amount in June. In the past 10 years, the variation rate of precipitation for each month was not consistent. In May, June and August, the annual variation was relatively big. For the daily rainfall distribution, it was found that rainfall was generally bigger during the daytime than the nighttime. The rainfall peak hour was in the afternoon in spring; the rainfall peak hour was before noon in summer and there were two peak times for the daily rainfall in autumn. The rainy days were very few in winter and the hourly rainfall distribution in a day was relatively even. In terms of spatial distribution for the month rainfall, there were two patterns.Firstly, the precipitation in the central region and southeast area was relatively high; while the precipitation in the northwest region was relatively low. Secondly, the monthly precipitation increased (or decreased) gradually from northwest to southeast. Studying of the temporal and spatial precipitation characteristics in Shenzhen was valuable for the local disaster prevention due to heavy rainfall and was of great guidance to the utilization and management of water resources in the area.