In this paper, we consider the asymptotic stability of the incompressible two-dimensional(2D) magnetohydrodynamic(MHD) system near the Couette flow at high Reynolds number and high magnetic Reynolds number in a finite channel $$\Omega =\mathbb {T}\times [-1,1]$$
Ω
=
T
×
[
-
1
,
1
]
. We extend the results of the Navier–Stokes equations (for the previous results see[10]) to the MHD system. We prove that if the initial velocity $$V_{in}$$
V
in
and the initial magnetic field $$B_{in}$$
B
in
satisfy $$\Vert \left( V_{in}-(y,0), B_{in}-(1,0)\right) \Vert _{H_{x,y}^{2}}\le \epsilon \text {min}\{\nu ,\mu \}^\frac{1}{2}$$
‖
V
in
-
(
y
,
0
)
,
B
in
-
(
1
,
0
)
‖
H
x
,
y
2
≤
ϵ
min
{
ν
,
μ
}
1
2
for some small $$\epsilon$$
ϵ
independent of $$\nu ,\mu$$
ν
,
μ
, then the solution of the system remains within $$\mathcal{O}(\text {min}\{\nu ,\mu \}^\frac{1}{2})$$
O
(
min
{
ν
,
μ
}
1
2
)
of Couette flow, and close to Couette flow as $$t\rightarrow \infty$$
t
→
∞
; the magnetic field remains within $$\mathcal{O}(\text {min}\{\nu ,\mu \}^\frac{1}{2})$$
O
(
min
{
ν
,
μ
}
1
2
)
of the (1, 0), and close to (1, 0) as $$t\rightarrow \infty$$
t
→
∞
.