Forest soil is the largest carbon pool in terrestrial ecosystem, and the soil-to-atmosphere CO₂ flux (soil respiration, Rs) is the main link between soil and atmosphere. However, due to the lack of integration of field observations, substantial uncertainties exist in quantifying large-scale soil carbon effluxes, which limit our understanding of the fate of forest soil in a warming world. Here, China’s forest ecosystems were divided into six forest types in six regions, and an integrated soil respiration database (N=634) was compiled to evaluate soil carbon effluxes by random sampling with replacement. Average annual Rs was 783 g C m^-2 yr^-1 across China, ranking from the highest to the lowest as follows: East, Southwest, South, Northwest, Northeast and North. Total soil carbon emissions were 1472.6 Tg C yr^-1 in China’s forest ecosystems, and about 69% from three southern regions (i.e., Southwest, Southern China and Eastern China) and 31% from three northern regions (i.e., Northwest, Northern China and Northeast). Evergreen needleleaf forest (529.09 Tg C yr^-1, 52%) and evergreen broadleaf forest (343.01 Tg C yr^-1, 34%) were the main source of soil carbon emissions in three southern regions, while deciduous broadleaf forest (334.36 Tg C yr^-1, 74%) was the main emissions in three northern regions. Our results provide a better understanding of the distribution and magnitude of soil carbon effluxes in China’s forest ecosystems.