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On the basis of climate zones classified by the number of days of the daily average temperature ≥ 10 °C (DT10) over China, the performance of the 9 CMIP5 climate models is evaluated in this paper. The results indicate that the CMCC-CMS and MPI-ESM-MR show higher skill than the other 7 models in simulating spatial pattern and its decadal change of climate zones over China. The simulation results for FGOALS-g2 and INM-CM4 both show relatively lower skill than the other 7 models. Meanwhile, the performance of multi-model ensemble in simulating climate zones over China is obviously better than the simulated result of any single model. So, it is a good way to simulate climate zones by multi-model ensemble to reduce some uncertainty of climate models. However, it is crucial to select appropriate ensemble members. Compared with 1960-2005, the climatic zones in China have an obvious trend of northward shift in 2021-2100. The range of southern sub-tropical belt expands to the most areas in the south of Yangtze River under RCP4.5 emission scenarios, and further extends to the north areas of Yangtze River with a maximum of 2-6° of latitude under RCP8.5 emission scenarios. Middle sub-tropical belt shifts gradually to the areas between Yellow River and north areas of the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. Northern sub-tropical belt shifts northward to southeastern North China. Warm extra-tropical belt extends to the most of Northeast China, most of central Inner Mongolia, and northern Xinjiang under RCP8.5 emission scenarios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]