The Yangtze River Delta region of China takes the lead in the protection of traditional crafts across the country. Studying the current situation of its policy system is of great significance for the protection of intangible cultural heritage not only in the Yangtze River Delta but also throughout China. Focusing on the traditional craft protection policies in the Yangtze River Delta, this study selected 64 relevant policy texts from 2000 to the present. Using NVivo 11 software, it conducted coding extraction and qualitative analysis on 188 free nodes and 29 tree nodes under 10 core categories covered in the policies, including the concept and directory system, legal subjects' rights and interests, the concept of hierarchical protection, talent team building, fund investment, resource utilization, multi-field collaboration, research deepening, digital technology support, and work coordination and supervision mechanisms.The research results show that the traditional craft protection policy system in the Yangtze River Delta region has presented diversified policy orientations, a relatively complete four-level structure, differentiated cross-border integration characteristics, and an initially formed regional collaboration mechanism. However, there are still certain limitations in aspects such as the precision of rights and interests protection, the explicit integration of digital technology, the construction of a sustainable path for "productive protection", the improvement of the closed-loop evaluation and supervision system, and the in-depth expansion of regional collaboration.