Abstract: The study aimed to investigate the effect of planting licorice on physical and chemical properties and microbial community functional diversity in saline soil. In this study bare land(no planting Glycyrrhiza inflate ) were set as control, using conventional methods, an experiment was conducted to investigate the changes of planting licorice on soil physical-chemical properties. Soil microbial community functional diversity was studied using Biolog plates. Results showed that compared with control, the contents of total nitrogen, alkalystic nitrigen and organic matter of planting licorice were significantly increased by 38%, 48% and 33% respectively (P＜0.05), electrical conductivity of soil was significantly decreased by 262% (P＜0.05). The Average Well Color Development (AWCD) indicated the activity of the soil microbial community. The results indicated that AWCD of soil growing licorice was higher than that of bare land (CK). Compared to bare land (CK), AWCD of soil growing licorice was significantly increased by 28% after 72h culture. The utilization of soil microorganism to sugar carbon sources in the licorice plot was significantly increased by 28% (P＜0.05) and the soil microbial diversity higher than bare land (CK) (P＜0.05). Principal component analyses demonstrated that licorice changed the soil microbial community composition. Sugars and amino acids were the primary carbon sources to lead to the difference, followed by the hydroxyl acids and polymers category carbon sources. In a word, planting licorice was help to improve the activity and functional diversity of soil microbial community in saline soil. So licorice cultivation was a reasonable choice for ecological restoration in saline soil.