Abstract: In order to improve the quality of the water ecological environment in urban area of Southwest China, the characteristics of the water ecological environment of 47 cities in Southwest China were summarized and the problems were identified and analyzed. It was shown that the discharge quantity of urban domestic wastewater from this region were large, with 10 that of cities accounting for more than 90 percent of the total domestic discharge load. Nearly 60 percent of urban drainage infrastructure lagged behind the national average. The industrial sources were concentrated in the food and chemical industries, and the heavy pollution from non-point sources appeared in April and May. One-third of the cities had low utilization rate of reclaimed water. Under the influence of urbanization process in the region, the eutrophication became a serious problem and the aquatic biodiversity of rivers and lakes decreased in urban waters. Based on these problems and combined with the relevant development plans of the cities, the urban water ecological environmental quality improvement objectives in the region were put forward in three terms, namely, the short term (2021-2025), the medium term (2026-2030) and the long term (2031-2035). The countermeasures and roadmap for the comprehensive improvement of urban water ecological environment were given. In the first term, the focuses should be on emission reduction and source pollution control. In the medium term, it should focus on building water-saving cities in an all-round way. In the long term, fully recovering the structure and function of urban aquatic ecosystem should be targeted.