Drought, a recurring disturbance in water cycle, significantly impacts terrestrial ecosystems. Understanding the response and recovery times of ecosystems to drought is imperative for assessing drought impacts and unraveling ecological dynamics. However, the dominant factors influencing response and recovery times of vegetation productivity to drought remain unclear. This study first evaluated the response and recovery times of vegetation productivity to soil drought using gross primary production (GPP) from an event-based perspective in China. Random forest models were used to identify the dominant factors of response and recovery times, and the relationship between response and recovery times was also investigated. Results showed that the mean GPP response time was 3.29 months, increasing from humid southeast to arid northwest China during 1989-2019. The mean recovery time was 3.46 months, longer in humid eastern regions compared to arid western ones. GPP responded most promptly in spring drought and slowly in autumn and winter droughts, whereas recovery was quick in summer and autumn droughts, and delayed in spring and winter droughts. Moreover, a notable negative correlation existed between response and recovery times with a long response time associating with a fast recovery rate and a short response time indicating a long recovery time. Drought duration was the primary factor influencing response time, while soil moisture during the recovery period was the critical for recovery time. These findings suggest resilience strategies to enhance ecosystem adaptability by strengthening adaptive capacities in regions with prolonged recovery time and safeguarding regions with long response time and rapid recovery capacity.