Abstract: Taking 41 cities in the Yangtze River Delta as objects of investigation, this paper uses micro-trade data and combines other city-level data to form panel data to explore the effect and mechanism of digital economy on the quality upgrading of manufacturing export products.The findings are as follows: first, digital economy has a significant promoting effect on the quality improvement of manufacturing export products, which is supported by the endogeneity and robustness tests; second, the digital economy promotes the quality of manufacturing exports by improving production efficiency and R&D innovation; third, the level of financial development plays an inhibitory role in the process of digital economy promoting the quality improvement of manufacturing exports.Therefore, this paper suggests that we should give full play to the leading advantages of the Yangtze River Delta in the field of digital economy and manufacturing; manufacturing enterprises should take the initiative to carry out digital transformation and make full use of digital technology to improve the mode of production; improve the overall function of the financial sector to serve the real economy.