At present, under successive shocks such as surging anti-globalization trends and geopolitical conflicts, the Chinese government has increasingly emphasized the “resilience” demonstrated by the economic system in response to uncertain shocks. As a vast country with a large territory, China’s super-large-scale market is the key to offsetting external shocks. However, market segmentation caused by local protectionism has seriously weakened China’s advantage as a major country. The fair competition review system, as an important institutional arrangement for building a unified national market, provides an ideal research scenario for how to effectively leverage the advantage of being a major country to offset external shocks. Nevertheless, few scholars have examined its significant role in promoting the construction of resilient cities. The article takes the fair competition review system as a quasi-natural experiment and uses the difference-in-differences model to examine the impact of this system on urban economic resilience based on panel data from 268 Chinese cities during the period from 2011 to 2022. The empirical results show that: First, the fair competition review system helps enhance the level of urban economic resilience. Second, the heterogeneity analysis finds that the fair competition review system has a more significant effect on enhancing the economic resilience of cities with higher review intensity, urban agglomeration cities, and non-resource-based cities. Third, the mechanism test finds that the fair competition review system can further improve urban economic resilience by improving the efficiency of capital allocation, improving the efficiency of labor allocation, and promoting urban innovation levels. Compared with the existing literature, the innovations of this paper are mainly reflected in the following three aspects: First, it extends the research on the implementation effects of the fair competition review system. To date, the fair competition review system has been in place for nine years. However, only a few scholars have empirically studied the effects of this policy. Especially under the current complex domestic and international circumstances, research analyzing its macroeconomic impact from the perspective of “resilience” is extremely rare. This paper is the first to examine the relationship between the fair competition review system and urban economic resilience at the city level, thus expanding the relevant research. Second, it enriches the factors influencing urban economic resilience. Existing literature mostly focuses on regional conditions to investigate the determinants of urban economic resilience. In contrast, this paper conducts analysis from the perspective of the market system, thereby enriching the literature in this field. Third, it identifies the mechanism through which the fair competition review system affects urban economic resilience. Starting from the dual perspectives of factor allocation efficiency and technological innovation, this paper explores the mechanism of this impact. Moreover, it conducts in-depth research based on different levels of review intensity and various urban characteristics, further deepening the understanding of the relationship between the two. This paper evaluates the implementation effects of the fair competition review system at the city level. The conclusion of the study not only reveals the internal logic through which the fair competition review system affects the level of urban economic resilience, but also provides new ideas and evidence for improving China’s secondary market operation system and for building resilient cities in the complex domestic and international environment.