Geochemical analyses are used to assess how the sediment records reflect the environmental changes of the Jiaozhou Bay. In the Last one hundred years, especially the last two decades, the Jiaozhou Bay has been greatly impacted by the increase of industrial activities and human interventions. A dated core sediment by ~ 210 Pb chronology was analyzed for concentrations of trace metals such as Li, Cd, Cr, Pb, Cu, Ni, Co, Zn together with C, N, P and BSi. Moreover, the burial fluxes of biogenic elements combined with the sedimentation rates were also calculated. The results showed that the development of the Jiaozhou Bay environment in the last one hundred years can be divided into three stages: (1) before the 1980s characterized by the relatively low sedimentation rate, weak heavy metal pollution and scarce eutrophication; (2) from the 1980s to 2000 or so, accelerating in the 1990s, during which high sedimentation rates, heavily polluted by heavy metals and biogenic elements as well as the frequent occurrence of red tide; (3) after 2000, the period that the improvement of environment, the whole system has been meliorated including the heavy metal pollution and hypernutriention.