Introduction Scientific evaluation of the suitability of human settlement in arid areas and a grasp of their spatial differentiation characteristics are of great significance for the implementation of regional human settlement environment (HSE) improvement according to local conditions. Methods In this study, we took Gansu Province (GS), a typical arid area in China, as the research object. First, based on field research, we used the analytic hierarchy process to determine the weights of 12 evaluation indicators a…