Abstract: The spacial distribution and diurnal variation as well as the characteristics of the lightning activity, radar echo height and microwave brightness temperature of precipitation systems over the eastern China and adjacent seas have been investigated by using the data from the precipitation radar (PR), lightning imaging sensor (LIS), and passive microwave imaging (TMI) onboard the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite for the eight warm seasons of 1998-2005, and the relationship between the lightning activity and radar echo height, and between the microwave brightness temperature and ice precipitation content are analyzed quantitatively. The recipitation systems are classified as systems without ice scattering (NoIces), systems with ice scattering (IcePSs) and systems with an MCS (McsPSs). The results show that NoIces account for more than 85% of the population, IcePSs for about 10%, and McsPSs for about 1.5% over both of the regions. There is an obvious diurnal variation of precipitation systems over the eastern Chinese mainland, and the diurnal change amplitude over the East China Sea is small. 93% and 97% of the precipitation systems over the eastern Chinese mainland and the East China Sea, respectively，have no lighting record and the probability of lightning occurrence over the former is higher than that over the latter. McsPSs not only have the highest flash rate, but also contribute more than half of the total lighting. With the enhancement of precipitation system intensity, the maximum height of 20 dBz significantly increases and the minimum polarization corrected temperatures (PCTs) at 85 GHz and 37 GHz gradually decrease. For the same value of maximum height of 20 dBz or minimum PCTs at 85 GHz, the probability of lightning occurrence of precipitation systems over the eastern Chinese mainland is higher than that over the East China Sea. The relationship between the flash rate and the minimum PCTs at 85 GHz is better than that between the flash rate and the maximum height of 20 dBz, and compared with relation between the two former, the correlation between the flash rate and the ice precipitation content within the layer of 7-11 km has a greater improvement. Further study indicates that there is a good dependence between the flash rate and the ice precipitation content within the 7-11 km on cell scales with the correlation coefficient higher than 0.7 over both of the regions.