The rural residential land functions are the comprehensive embodiment of the storage quantity and structural organization of the rural man–land system. Mastering the evolution rule and allocation situation is the basis of effective rural land management and targeted poverty alleviation activities. Based on the theoretical understanding of rural residential multifunction, this paper identifies five functional types and characteristic elements uses a variety of methods to calculate to reveal the spatio-temporal differentiation and allocation and discusses the process mechanism and spatial pattern of function optimization. According to the results, during the sample period, the multifunctional index of rural residential land in China was ranked from large to small as residential function (RF), living function (LF), service function (SF), production function (PF) and ecological function (EF), and the growth rate was ranked from large to small as ecological function (EF), production function (PF), residential function (RF), living function (LF) and service function (SF), and the comprehensive function index increased by more than 50%. The distribution characteristics of all the functional indexes were basically the same. The regional performance was east > central > northeast > west, and the range of each functional index in terms of the interprovincial performance decreased; however, the convergence degree increased, and the number of provinces with comparative advantages in terms of the various functions expanded to more than 50%. The living, ecological, and comprehensive functions increased, while the residential, production, and service functions decreased. The continuous deprivation of the functions and their deprivation in many provinces are problems. This study can provide decision support for promoting the normalization and standardization of superior rural functions
