The evolution of the peri\|urban landscape pattern of Xiamen over its rapid urbanization period from 1987 to 2007 was studied through the analyses of landscape transfer matrix, landscape indexes, and fractal method (box counting method). Based on RS and GIS techniques, five Landsat TM/ETM+ images, acquired respectively in 1987, 1992, 1997, 2002 and 2007, were used to construct landuse database for the studied area. The result shows that construction land area increased rapidly from 18.4 to 108.4 km2 in the suburb and from 35.7 to 114.9 km2 in the exurb over the 20\|year period. The urban expansion mainly occupied forestland, farmland, and sea. Farmland area decreased dramatically and had lost 19.74 and 33.11 km2 in the suburb and exurb, respectively, between 2002 and 2007 alone. While the urban expansion morphology has become stabilized in the suburb districts, it remains unstable in Xiamen exurb areas. Coastal reclamation effort in this region has been governed by policies in various phases. The coastal line tended to be simplified and straightened with fractal dimensions decreased from 1.236 to 1.191 and from 1.267 to 1.262 for the suburb and exurb, respectively. The recent government decision to transform Xiamen from an island city to a bay city had an important effect on coastal reclamation and had added 13.32 and 9.15 km2 of reclamation areas in suburb and exurb, respectively, over the 5 year period from 2002 to 2007, more than the total area reclaimed over the 15 years from 1987 to 2002.