As one of the three major development strategies of our country, the impact of rapid urbanization of the Yangtze River Economic Belt on farmland resources cannot be ignored. The main problem facing China's urbanization is the massive encroachment on farmland by the rapid urbanization of land. However, in recent years, the rapid development of the Yangtze River Basin and the Yangtze River Economic Belt and its impact on farmland resources is still lacking a comprehensive and systematic analysis. This study is based on remote sensing data of middle resolution, to cover the Yangtze River Economic Belt and the Yangtze River Basin within the scope of 156 prefecture-level cities as the research objectives. The impact of urbanization on farmland from 2000 to 2015 was analyzed from the perspective of combining natural locations (upper, middle, and lower reaches) and urban size (population size), and the results show that:(1) From 2000 to 2015, the artificial surface in the Yangtze River Basin and the Yangtze River Economic Belt increased by 56.80% in total and the farmland decreased by 17.09%. Among these areas, the artificial surface of the lower reaches shows the most significant increase, and the reduction of arable land is the most obvious; (2) As time passes, the pressure of urbanization on farmland in the Yangtze River Basin and the Yangtze River Economic Belt is gradually decreasing, and the artificial surface growth rate increased from 2733.75 km²/a to 2985.87 km²/a over the past 15 years, while the rate of decrease in farmland decreased from 4439.94 km²/a to 3940.91 km²/a, with a large number of dry fields changed to paddy fields; (3) For cities of different sizes located in different basins, there is a significant difference in the impact of the increase of artificial surface on farmland. For example, the artificial surface of the medium-sized cities in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River increased most (increase range 385.88%) in 15 years, and the farmland also lost the most; the metropolitan cities in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River have the fastest artificial surface growth rates, while the upper reaches are huge cities, this phenomenon shows that there is an uncoordinated development in the Yangtze River Basin. The optimal layout of cities in the future along the Yangtze River Basin and Economic Belt should not only give full consideration to the protection of farmland but also balance the expansion speed of cities of different sizes and further improve the utilization efficiency of development land.