Investigating the mechanism of urban green development on land use efficiency holds significant practical implications for enhancing land use efficiency in Chinese cities and achieving carbon neutrality goals. Based on panel data from 285 prefecture-level cities in China from 2005 to 2020, this paper employs the super-efficiency SBM model, panel cluster analysis, and spatial visualization methods to analyze the spatiotemporal evolution and spatial differences of land use efficiency and explore the impact mechanism of urban green development on land use efficiency. The study reveals that: (1) Urban green development significantly promotes the improvement of land use efficiency, and this conclusion remains robust after conducting sensitivity tests, such as using terrain undulation and river density as instrumental variables. (2) Mechanism analysis indicates that urban green development mainly enhances land use efficiency through agglomeration effects, technological effects, and structural effects. (3) The impact of urban green development on land use efficiency exhibits heterogeneity. Compared to the eastern region, the promotion effect of urban green development on land use efficiency in the western and central regions is more significant; compared to coastal cities, the influence of urban green development on inland cities is more pronounced.