China has the largest tungsten reserve and tungsten output whose reserve are four times of other countries in the world, tungsten ore was found early 10th century and was called "heavy stones" at that time.Tungsten ore in China is mainly located in the Sanjiang tungsten tin metallogenic belt,West Qinling-Qilianshan metallogenic belt, Tianshan-Beishan metallogenic belt, south China metallogenic belt and north China metallogenic belt. Nanling metallogenic belt is the most richiest in south China metallogenic belt, and numerous large and super large tungsten ores are distributed in this metallogenic belt with more than 70% reserve of China. The tungsten ore in China was mainly formed in Yanshanian era accounting for 83%, Hercynian era 9%, Caledonian era 4%, Precambrian era 2% and Indosinian era 2%.
Tungsten ore is widely distributed in China. Tungsten ore appears in Central-South, North, Northwest and Southwest regions of China. Most tungsten ores were found from Guangxi province, the West China, to Nanling area of Fujian Province in the East China, it went through Hunan, Guangdong and Jiangxi provinces. Particularly, the south of Jiangxi Province has the largest reserve occupying over half of the world. Therefore Jiangxi is called "tungsten capital".
Tungsten ore mainly concentrate in the Alps Himalayas and the circum Pacific Geological belt. China is located in these two geological zones, so it has rich reserve ranking first in the world. There are 252 ore producing areas discovered which are distributed in 23 provinces or regions.
During 2019, the total tungsten output in the world is 85,000 tons, China has 70,000 tons output accounting for 82.35% with the largest tungsten producing output in the world, Vietnam ranks second 4800 tons, following is Mongolia with 1900 tons, Russia 1500 tons, Bolivia with 1200 tons, North Korea 1100 tons, Rwanda 1100 tons, Australia 740 tons, Portugal 700 tons and Spain with 500 tons.
