To understand the characteristics and main impact factors of microplastics in wastewater at Shaanxi Province of China, the abundance, color, size and composition of microplastics in the influent and effluent of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) in two regions have been comprehensively studied. Three different types of wastewater have been investigated, including industrial wastewater, wastewater from urban area and wastewater from rural area. Compared with the microplastics in wastewater from industrial and urban areas, microplastics in the wastewater from rural area had a larger percentage of small particles (<0.5 mm) with bead shape. Polypropylene, polyethylene and polyethylene terephthalate were the three most abundant polymeric materials for microplastics. Furthermore, microplastics with film shape were relatively easy to be removed with the removal efficiency up to 90%. Our results have also shown that the types of wastewater, locations, population density, and treatment plant performance were all important factors influencing the potential microplastics pollution. Source control was considered as the most effective measure for preventing the microplastics pollution.