In order to improve the overall performance of front- and rear-independent-drive electric vehicles, a coordinated control strategy (CCS) is proposed to integrate the control actions of front-rear torque distribution controller and acceleration slip regulation controller. Firstly, an economy-oriented torque distribution controller and an acceleration slip regulation controller based on sliding mode control theory are designed. Then, a coordinated control strategy integrating the effects of the two controllers is proposed. Different from the existing integrated control strategies, instead of a simple combination of front-rear torque distribution and acceleration slip regulation control, the proposed strategy is a reasonable and effective integration which takes into consideration of vehicle safety, economy and dynamic performance. Under normal driving conditions, the vehicle operates in an economic mode by default, and the proposed CCS monitors the slip ratio of each wheel in real time. When the road condition deteriorates and economic driving cannot be sustained, appropriate torque compensation is applied without jeopardizing vehicle safety. By this means, road adhesion is made full use of and vehicle dynamic performance is optimized. Finally, the proposed CCS is verified through simulation studies in the MATLAB/CarSim environment. The simulation results show that when the opening of the accelerator pedal is 10%, 30% and 50%, the proposed CCS improves the vehicle dynamic performance by 15.3%, 35.6% and 4.5%, respectively, compared to traditional integrated control strategy (TICS).