Abstract: The basin-mountain coupling theory has been widely recognized; however, it does not work well when it comes to the basin-mountain systems in extensional regime. To unravel the basin-mountain coupling relationships under extensional regime, our study integrates field outcrops, borehole and seismic data, and geochemical and thermochronological data from the Jianghan Basin and surrounding mountains, systematically clarifying their tectonic evolution. The surrounding mountains successively experienced rapid cooling, continued cooling, slow cooling and rapid cooling stages, and the Jianghan Basin accordingly experienced compressional deformation, thermal doming, rifting and subsidence, and post-rift evolution. The upwelling of asthenospheric mantle not only drove the basin to undergo rifting and subsidence, but also delivered a large amount of deep composite materials to the basin. Our study proposes that the Jianghan Basin got progressively deeper and deeper during the formation of the basin-mountain system, while the surrounding mountains got progressively lower and lower. The influence between the Jianghan Basin and surrounding mountains is multi-faceted and single-directional. Their coupling model can be summarized as follow: 1) surrounding mountains shape the basin; 2) mountain exhumation results in basin filling and 3) the basin with increasing heat input transfers heat to surrounding mountains.