By employing the analytic hierarchy process method，this paper analyzes changing pattern of population migration and economic growth across China’s provinces，and further assesses their coordination characteristics in a coupling perspective． Results show that，at the country，region and province levels，stable coupling coordination mechanisms exist between population migration and economic growth，but the coupling levels are not high，which are decreasing from East to West． Meanwhile，there appears to be some appropriateness between migration and economic growth． However coupling levels are declining at all regions，which means that，with the advancing transformation of development pattern，economic growth will be increasingly driven by migration of high － quality human capital labour．