Graduate tutors are an important group to cultivate high-quality innovative talents. With the rapid development of higher education, the work pressure faced by graduate tutors is increasing, which is not conducive to the physical and mental health of graduate tutors and the quality of postgraduate training. To comprehensively grasp the work pressure situation of graduate tutors in colleges and universities under the new situation, effectively alleviate the work pressure of graduate tutors, and avoid job burnout, the measurement scale of graduate tutors’work pressure is developed on the basis of literature research from five dimensions: teaching pressure, scientific research pressure, guidance pressure, role pressure and system pressure, and a survey questionnaire is developed. The reliability and validity of the measurement scale are tested based on 421 sample data. Overall level analysis, single factor analysis and regression analysis are carried out on the current situation of work pressure of graduate tutors. Results show that the developed measurement scale has good reliability and validity; the overall work pressure level of graduate tutors in colleges and universities under the new situation is between moderate pressure and large pressure; the pressure levels of the five pressure sources from high to low are system pressure, scientific research pressure, guidance pressure, teaching pressure and role pressure; there are some differences in the work pressure of graduate tutors in different dimensions for different gender, age stage, identity, title, working years, subject field and university type. On this basis, the countermeasures and suggestions to alleviate the work pressure of graduate tutors are put forward from three aspects: establishing an effective mechanism to alleviate the graduate tutors’work pressure, improving graduate tutors’ability to cope with work pressure, and paying attention to the work pressure of key graduate tutors groups.