A field experiment was carried out in rice planting field in Northeast China, to investigate the effect of controlled release nitrogen fertilizer side strip application on rice yield and nitrogen losses. Five treatments were set up, including no nitrogen fertilizer as control (CK), farmer conventional fertilization (FP), high amount controlled release nitrogen fertilizer (HN), medium amount controlled release nitrogen fertilizer (MN), and low amount controlled release nitrogen fertilizer (LN). The effects of controlled release nitrogen fertilizer side strip application on rice yield, nitrogen recovery rate, agronomic efficiency, runoff loss, and total nitrogen concentration in leaching water at different levels were studied. Results showed that the grain yield in HN treatment and MN treatment that reduce 10% to 20% nitrogen fertilizer use show no significant change compared with that in FP treatment. The number of spikes and grain number per spike in HN treatment were 10.79% and 15.38% higher than that in FP treatments, respectively. When the nitrogen fertilizer was reduced by 30% (LN treatment), the grain yield of rice was significantly decreased. In HN treatment, the recovery rate of nitrogen fertilizer increased by 5.23%, and the agronomic efficiency of nitrogen fertilizer was 6.48 kg/kg higher than that in FP treatment. Compared with the FP treatment, controlled release nitrogen fertilizer Side Strip Application treatments reduced the total nitrogen concentration and runoff loss in surface water, nitrogen loss reduction rate in HN treatment, MN treatment and LN treatment varied between 37.32%～47.10%. Controlled release nitrogen fertilizer Side Strip Application can reduced the risk of nitrogen losses, delayed both the total nitrogen concentration in the leaching water and the peak time of the total nitrogen concentration, .and be considered as an environment-friendly fertilization technology that takes rice yield into account.