Abstract. Urbanization results in high N deposition and impacts N cycling of forest ecosystems, which increases soil inorganic N pool, including soil N availability, especially for nitrate. However, it is still unknown it is true in south China where ammonium always dominates in soils for long-term traditional agricultural activities. We investigated the changes in soil inorganic N availability responding to urbanization in Pearl River Delta (PRD), China, one of the largest urban areas of the world. Soil total inorganic N levels did not show an obvious growth in urbanized (urban and urban/suburban) sites compared with non-urbanized (suburban/rural and rural) sites based on non-significant differences in their concentrations, but nitrate enriched. Our study demonstrated that urbanization resulting in extra N input does not significantly enhance soil total inorganic N availability instead of the changes in its composition, indicating that N cycling in this region is accelerated and its N status is N-rich even N-saturated, consequently potential ecological risks might happen, including nitrate leaching, eutrophication, and plant preference for nitrate. Therein N pollution dominated by nitrate should be paid special attention in China.