Abstract: 【Objective】 Halesia carolina L., commonly called the snowdrop-tree, is a small understory tree of the genus Halesia in the family Styracaceae. This species has high ornamental value for its spell-binding beauty when in blossom. Here, we used the Maxent model to predict the potential suitable cultivation distribution of H. carolina in China. 【Method】 We used the ENMeval package in R software to optimize parameters of the Maxent model, and simulated suitable cultivation regions of H. carolina based on 57 geographical distribution records and 7 bioclimatic variables. Percent contribution, permutation importance, and multivariate analysis of variance were applied to evaluate the limiting variables and environment differences between China and America. 【Result】Feature combination of linear, quadratic, product and hinge and the regularization multiplier of 1.5 significantly decreased model complexity and the degree of overfitting. Accuracy of the Maxent model was very high, as indicated by the area under the receiver operator characteristic curve for a test dataset of 0.956 7±0.032 9. The suitable cultivation regions in China cover eastern and northern Taiwan, eastern Hainan Island, western and southwestern Yunnan, and the central and eastern mainland of China. Multivariate analysis of variance and robust multivariate analysis of variance showed that differences in climate between China and America were significant. Variables representing variation in precipitation and temperature had greater differences than variables indicative of extreme temperatures.【Conclusion】 Precipitation factors are strongly related to the potential geographical distribution of H. carolina, seasonal precipitation may be the main factor restricting the suitable cultivation regions in China.