Abstract: With the high-yielding winter wheat cultivar Jimai 22 as test material, a three-year field experiment was conducted to examine the effects of border length for irrigation on flag leaf water potential, photosynthetic characteristics, dry matter accumulation and distribution of wheat. In the 2010-2011 growing season, six treatments were installed, i.e., the field border length was designed as 10 m (L₁₀), 20 m (L₂₀), 40 m (L₄₀), 60 m (L₆₀), 80 m (L₈₀) and 100 m (L₁₀₀). In the 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 growing seasons, the field border length was designed as 40 m (L₄₀), 60 m (L₆₀), 80 m (L₈₀) and 100 m (L₁₀₀). The results showed that the average relative soil water content of the 0-200 cm soil layer was presented as L₈₀, L₆₀>L₁₀₀>L₄₀>L₂₀>L₁₀ at anthesis in the 2010-2011 growing season and as L₈₀, L₆₀>L₁₀₀>L₄₀ in the 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 growing seasons. At 11 d and 21 d after anthesis, the water potential, net photosynthetic rate and transpiration rate of flag leaf were presented as L₈₀, L₁₀₀>L₆₀>L₄₀>L₂₀, L₁₀, and as L₈₀>L₆₀, L₁₀₀>L₄₀, L₂₀, L₁₀ at 31 d after anthesis. The coefficients of variability both of the dry matter accumulation at anthesis and maturity and of grain yield in different regions of L₈₀ field were lower than those of L₁₀₀. The average dry matter accumulation, dry matter accumulation after anthesis and the contribution to grain of L₈₀ were dramatically higher than those of L₁₀₀, L₄₀, L₂₀ and L₁₀. L₈₀ had the highest average grain yield and water use efficiency, being the best treatment for irrigation in our study.