Introduction: Agricultural modernization and sustainable development face significant challenges from persistent urban-rural income disparities, which constrain agricultural transformation and rural revitalization. This study investigates the comprehensive impact mechanism of agricultural technological innovation on urban-rural income disparities through a multi-dimensional analytical framework integrating productivity enhancement, structural transformation, and spatial heterogeneity effects.Methods: Using panel data from 280 Chinese cities during 2008 - 2021, we employ two-way fixed effects panel regression models to examine the relationship between agricultural technological innovation (measured by patent applications) and urban–rural income gaps (measured by the Theil index). The analysis includes robustness tests, heterogeneity analysis across regions and institutional contexts, mechanism testing through mediation analysis, and threshold effect analysis using Hansen’s threshold regression technique.Results: The integrated analysis reveals that agricultural technological innovation serves as a fundamental driver for narrowing urban-rural income gaps through interconnected pathways of employment structure optimization, factor allocation improvement, and production efficiency enhancement. Agricultural technological innovation effectively reduces the urban-rural income gap, with invention patents showing particularly significant effects. Heterogeneity analysis indicates stronger effects in eastern and western regions, and in cities with higher administrative levels, greater innovation vitality, stronger intellectual property protection, and better information accessibility. The empirical evidence reveals non-linear threshold effects, where innovation impact strengthens systematically as urbanization rates, education attention, and information accessibility increase.Discussion: The findings form a cohesive framework for understanding innovation-driven rural development and validate agricultural technological innovation as a critical mechanism for achieving income convergence. Policy recommendations include strengthening agricultural technological innovation support, optimizing rural labor structure, promoting urbanization and information infrastructure development, and enhancing policy coordination to maximize the equalizing effects of agricultural innovation across diverse regional contexts.

Amid global economic transformation, a persistent productivity gap exists between developed and developing nations in agriculture sector, shaped by technological advancements and shifting resource allocation patterns. Agricultural socialized services (ASS), defined as organized systems providing technical support, mechanization assistance, information services, market linkages, and resource optimization to farmers, have emerged as critical mechanisms for agricultural development. In developing economies, these services catalyze gains in agricultural labor productivity through the integration of advanced technologies and the mechanization of farming practices. Using panel data from 30 Chinese provinces during 2011 to 2022, this study investigates the relationship between ASS and ALP, focusing on regional heterogeneity, threshold effects, and spatial spillovers. The combination of spatial econometric methods and threshold analysis was selected for its unique capacity to capture both the geographic interdependencies and nonlinear relationships that characterize agricultural development processes. These thresholds at 5.254 and 8.478 represent critical points where the impact of ASS on ALP significantly changes in magnitude, revealing a nonlinear relationship that evolves across different stages of agricultural development. The study highlights notable regional disparities in the impact of ASS. Specifically, ASS is more effective on ALP in eastern, central and key food-producing regions, while its impact is relatively weak in western and non-food-producing regions. Spatial spillover analysis indicates that advancements in ASS create positive externalities, extending beyond their immediate implementation zones and facilitating inter-provincial agricultural cooperation and development. These findings provide crucial guidance for policymakers and agricultural service providers to optimize resource allocation and service delivery strategies. By identifying critical development thresholds and regional variations, this research offers evidence-based support for government officials designing targeted agricultural policies and enterprises developing region-specific service models to foster sustainable agricultural growth across diverse regional landscapes.