Abstract: The sprawl of a metropolis driven by urbanization has a positive impact on the expansion of satellite cities around it, which also results in rapid changes of regional land use types. The purpose of this research aimed at deeply understanding the utilization characteristics of rural residential land in the satellite city area of Beijing. In this paper, taking the key construction satellite city of Beijing, Shunyi District, as a study area, based on the vector data base of a second national land survey in 2009, combining the methods of quantitative geography models and GIS spatial analysis technology, analyses were conducted of the utilization characteristics, internal structure, and spatial distribution and driving force of the rural residential area. It was concluded that: 1) In the course of rapid industrialization and urbanization, the rural residential land in metropolitan and satellite city areas also manifest obvious changes. The demands of space and raw material storage of industries diversifies the land use types in rural residential land. There are many land use types in rural residential areas, and the industrial land and warehouse land have been the important types, which reflect the rural economic activities, especially, some towns' industrial land area has been the dominant land use type. 2) Spatial differences are significantly large in the utilization of rural residential land of different towns, with the role of location factors being relatively prominent. The average size of the rural residential area of the central and western regions were too large, and the location index and diversity index are relatively high; the stability index shows a spatial pattern that rose gradually from west to east, but the rural residential land that are involved in the economic impact of airport logistics had higher stability, and its land using forms were more regular. 3) The spatial distribution of the rural population and rural residential areas showed obviously disjoint, with a large number of the rural population, who have been almost taken out of traditional agricultural production, gathered at the edge of the built-up areas. 4) The rural residential land and its internal structure characteristics reflect different levels of development of productive forces, and rural industrial development has become the most direct driving force in promoting space morphological changes of rural living and production. So, the research concluded that the rural residential land is similar to the utilization of urban land with the development of the rural economy, therefore there is a need for rural residential land management and planning which inevitably leads to reform and development. In order to optimize future spatial layout of a metropolis, satellite cities, town and rural residential land, and proper spatial layout of cities, towns and villages need to be optimized. And rural residential land located on the outskirts of satellite cities should be consolidated first in the priority order. Finally, the paper can provide an academic basis for rural residential land planning, land consolidation, and new countryside construction and rural industrial development in practice.