The magnetic susceptibility (chi) of surface soils on the Chinese Loess Plateau (CLP) has strong positive correlation with mean annual precipitation. It is widely accepted that ultrafine magnetite/maghemite grains produced during pedogenesis are responsible for the enhancement of chi, and loess chi on the CLP has been widely used as a proxy for the intensity of the East Asian summer monsoon. However, few works have investigated mechanisms for the enhancement of chi in the case of surface aeolian sediments in westerly-dominated inland China, north of the Tibetan Plateau. Here detailed rock magnetism and grain size studies of 49 surface samples taken across the southern Tarim Basin for different rainfall/temperature/altitude conditions are presented. The results show that samples taken from desert have the lowest chi values and that chi of loessic sand and loess samples decreases with increasing altitude. In addition, the rock magnetism studies suggest that the magnetic properties of surface soils across the southern Tarim Basin are mainly controlled by the concentration of coarse aeolian ferrimagnetic minerals. The contribution of ultrafine pedogenically produced magnetic grains to chi is very limited.