Abstract: The paper aims to explain the role of spatio-temporal differences of tourism economy in promoting the coordinated development of tourism economy and improving the development level of tourism in Gannan Prefecture. We took 7 counties and 1 city (county-level city) in Gannan as the research object, and analyzed the characteristics of spatio-temporal differences of tourism economy from 2010 to 2016, by using the methods of variation coefficient, Thiel index, and factor analysis. The results showed that: the tourism economy of Gannan presented an upward trend; the absolute difference of tourism economy was gradually increasing, and the relative difference was slowly decreasing; the intra-regional differences gradually narrowed and affected the overall development trend of Gannan’s differences of tourism economy; the differences of tourism economic development level in the 7 counties and 1 city in Gannan had 3 different types of region in space. It is suggested that Gannan should make great efforts to narrow the differences of tourism economy in improving tourism infrastructure conditions, developing new tourism projects and tourism products, strengthening tourism cooperation and expanding publicity channels.