Abstract: To better understand the mechanisms and response of snowfall to climate change,daily meteorological data from 49 stations in and around the Tianshan Mountains were used to extract the snowfall sequence with a parametrized snowfall identification scheme. The changing characteristics of different snowfall events in the Tianshan Mountains from 1961 to 2016 were analyzed using the percentile threshold method. The results showed that:① The snowfall was larger and more frequent in the mountain region than that in the basin,snowfall on the northern slopes was greater than that on the southern slopes,and snowfall decreased from northwest to southeast. ② In the past 56 years,the snowfall in the Tianshan Mountains has increased significantly and the snowfall frequency has increased slightly. The trends in snowfall amount and snowfall frequency at all types were as follows:light snow decreased significantly, moderate snow had no obvious trend,and heavy snow and extreme snow increased significantly. The regions with significant snowfall changes were concentrated in the central region of the northern Tianshan Mountains and Yili River valley. The increase of snowfall was mainly because of an increase in extreme snowfall and snowfall frequency. ③ Annual snowfall,heavy snowfall and snowfall frequency,and extreme snowfall and snowfall frequency increased abruptly in the mid-1980s,while the snowfall and snowfall frequency of other types showed no obvious change. ④ The increases in annual snowfall and extreme snowfall in the Tianshan Mountains were related to warmer temperatures.