Many studies have been conducted to investigate the tillage effects on soil urease activity. However, little attention is paid to the tillage effects on the turnover rate of soil urease. We studied the effects of medium-term conservational versus traditional tillage on activity and turnover rate of soil urease in the North China Plain. After inhibition of microorganism activity by toluene, the soil samples (0– 20 cm) were incubated at field moisture (25%, w/w) and 12.2 °C for 39 days. Urease activity was assayed on the 1st, 3rd, 6th, 11th, 18th, 28th and 39th day of incubation. The turnover rates were determined by fitting urease activity data to a simple exponential decay model: At = A0 exp (-kt)+b, where At was urease activity (μg g-1 h-1) at time t (d), A0 was urease activity (μg g-1 h-1) at time t=0, b was the residual activity of stabilized urease after the incubation (μg g-1 h-1), t was incubation time (d), and k was the turnover rate of soil urease (d-1). The results showed that conservational tillage significantly promoted both the activity and turnover rate of soil urease. The high turnover rate of soil urease indicates the high in-situ enzymatic activity, which could accelerate nitrogen cycle in soil. These results suggest the necessity of considering the effects of agricultural managements on the turnover rate of soil urease when assaying soil urease activity or modeling ecological processes in agricultural soils.