The convective characteristics of rainstorms in China are considerable, but the statistical relationship between rainstorms and short-duration heavy rainfall, which is one of the severe convective weather, remains unclear. The characteristics of the contribution of two types of short-duration heavy rainfall (hourly rainfall ≥20 mm and hourly rainfall ≥50 mm, referred to as HR20 and HR50, respectively) to different intensities of rainstorms are obtained by analyzing the hourly rainfall data collected during 1951-2019. The results show that the area of rainstorm with high frequency of short-duration heavy rainfall is not consistent with the area of high frequency days of rainstorms. Short-duration heavy rainfall has the most significant impact on rainstorms over the south part of North China, the Huanghuai Area and the Southwest to South China, where HR20 accounts for more than 50% of the rainstorm days. The south part of North China and the central part of South China have more than 70%, which is the highest. Furthermore, the proportion of short-duration heavy rainfall gradually increases as the intensity of rainstorms enhances, especially the HR50 has increased significantly. More than 60% of the extreme torrential rain days are accompanied by HR50, indicating that the more intense the rainstorm, the more significant the convection. The total precipitation amounts produced by short-duration heavy rainfall contribute most to the rainstorm over regions such as the south part of North China, Huanghuai Area, the east part of Southwest China and South China. The contribution of the short-duration heavy rainfall also increases significantly as the rainstorm intensity enhances, especially that of HR50 increased by more than 100%. In areas such as Jianghuai Area and Jiangnan, the contribution of the short-duration heavy rainfall is smaller, and its increase is relatively insignificant with the increase of the intensity of the rainstorm. In addition, when there is a short-duration heavy rainfall (HR20), the amounts of torrential rain and sever torrential rain increase by an average of 20% and 40% respectively compared to those with no short-duration heavy rainfall accompanied. This further demonstrates the convective characteristics of rainstorms in China.