Coastal fractal can be a quantitative factor to classification of coastal types, coastal evolvement, and status. This paper uses GIS and TM images to extract the Yellow river delta coastal data and calculates its fractal dimension (D) of the general coast, alluvial coast, erosion coast and manmade coast and gets their variance. The results indicate that the mean D value in alluvial coast (D=1.0807) is higher than the mean D value in erosion coast (D=1.0436) and than the mean D value in man-made coast (D=1.0551). These three have an obvious variance statistically. In time sequence, the D values in the general coast and in erosion coast change a little with a similar trend, while the D value in the alluvial coast has a big variance. The D value in the man-made coast trends to be stable after the coastal projects were gradually improved since 1989.