The land reserve management system is an important foundation for the state to strengthen the management of land assets owned by all people, optimize the allocation of land assets, and enhance the effective supply of land market. With the accelerated urbanization process in China, the problems of benefit distribution and rights attribution of land development rights have been highlighted, among which the problems caused by the lagging land reserve management system are more common. Taking institutional changes as the perspective, the study compares the jurisprudential investigation and practical evolution of the land reserve system, and explores the optimization logic and specific paths of the land reserve management system, which will provide new dynamics, new models and new paths for efficient allocation of land resources, improving urban quality and promoting economic and social development, with important theoretical and practical significance. Taking Chongqing as an example, this study starts from the current situation of the land reserve management system and carries out empirical analysis on the overall operation of land reserve, land operation efficiency of key functional areas, and land reserve management system in recent years. The practice shows that the land reserve management system has broadened land reserve financing channels, strongly supported local economic construction, controlled the financial risks of land reserve, and made the supervision of land reserve more convenient. Land reserve has promoted the construction of major projects, and the land reserve center has strengthened the primary market regulation and control, established the reserve land information database, scientifically prepared the reserve plan, accelerated the preliminary development, and coordinated the arrangement of various funds. The shortcomings are that the boundaries of functional authority of land reserve institutions are unclear, the mechanism of guaranteeing funds for reserve and remediation work is not sound, the mechanism of land spatial planning leading land reserve and remediation work has not been established, and the problems of pre-development of land reserve and systemic risks have not been paid enough attention. Based on theoretical and empirical analysis, the study concludes that land transfer should be driven by land entitling, land reserve should be activated by land transfer, land value management should be strengthened, land additional functions should be enhanced, and a sound land reserve system can help to effectively utilize undeveloped land resources, reduce idleness and loss of land resources, and guarantee the right to development of land resources. From a macro perspective, the reform path of promoting rural land transfer with land rights and activating land reserve innovation with land transfer is proposed. From a micro perspective, it is proposed that the organizational management system of land reserve should be rationalized, the financing system of land reserve capital should be optimized, the distribution system of land value-added revenue should be improved, the urban spatial governance system should be optimized, and the systemic risk response of land reserve should be strengthened to further regulate systemic risks such as macroeconomic downturn and land value decline.