As traditional drivers fade, cultivating new drivers has become the key to the high-quality development of China’s economy. In the new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation, the digital economy plays a strategic role in promoting high-quality economic development in China, by using data as a new key production factor and innovation as the driving force, and driving impetus change, efficiency change and quality change to increase total factor productivity. The mechanism for the digital economy to cultivate new drivers for the high-quality development of China’s economy is through four dimensions, namely allocation optimization, economies of scale, industrial integration, and innovation-driven growth. In the context of the digital economy, accelerating the cultivation of new drivers calls for the following efforts: speeding up digital innovation and promoting the driving force change, efficiency change, and quality change; accelerating the process of digital industrialization and pushing advanced industrial basic capabilities; using industrial digital transformation to promote the modernization of the industrial chain; and advancing the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry, and promoting the deep integration of the digital economy and the real economy.