Regional water storage monitoring is very essential and critical for regional water resource management, hydro-ecological sustainable development and studying interaction between hydrology and climate. We used multi-mission satellite dataset, a global hydrological model, and ground meteorological data to investigate the terrestrial water storage changes (TWSc) in the Qaidam basin (QB). Terrestrial water storage (TWS) exhibited an increasing trend for the past 17 years, and TWSc obtained from different methods or dataset were consistent with precipitation. Through the singular spectrum analysis, we obtained the interannual and seasonal components of TWSc, and significant shifts in the interannual TWSc were observed in the QB. TWS exhibited an increase from 2002 to 2013, a decrease from 2013 to 2016, and an accelerated increase after 2016. Additionally, the study reported that the interannual change in TWS was strongly correlated with the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), compared to Arctic Oscillation and El Nino-Southern Oscillation.