OBJECTIVE： To analyze the composition rules of paste formulas for insomnia and to provide reference for TCM in the treatment of insomnia. METHODS： The paste formulas for insomnia were collected from TCM Prescription Dictionary， TCM Plaster Pill Powder Dictionary·Ointment Sub-dictionary and Zhonghua Gao Zi Formula Series. The paste formulas were imported into the software of TCM inheritance support platform V2.5 to count the frequency of drug use. Apriori algorithm and association rules were used to analyze core combination of paste formulas statistically （support degree of 20％， confidence degree of 0.80）. Entropy clustering algorithm was used to calculate the correlation coefficients 2 ingredients of different medicines （correlation coefficient of 8， penalty coefficient of 2） and the core combination of medecine 3 and 4 ingredients. The new formula was extracted by unsupervised entropy hierarchical clustering method. RESULTS： Totally 125 paste formulas including 236 medicinal herbs were screened； the use frequency of 28 ingredients was greater or equal to 20 times， there were 7 ingredients for sedation， 5 ingredients for nourishing the blood and nourishing the liver， 3 ingredients for invigorating the spleen and dispelling dampness， 5 ingredients for enrich the qi， 4 ingredients for invigorate the supplement of blood， 2 ingredients for invigorate the circulation of blood， 2 ingredients for clearing heat. There were 28 common couplet medicines； top 3 couplet medicines in the list of frequency were Z. jujube-P. tenuifolia， P. cocos-Z. jujube， P. cocos-P. tenuifolia. P. cocos， Z. jujube and P. tenuifolia had the functions of invigorating the spleen and dampness， nourishing the mind， tranquilizing the mind and settling mind. 12 correlation regularities， 56 core combinations of 3 ingredients and 16 core combinations of 4 ingredients were obtained，and 7 new formulas for insomnia were obtained. CONCLUSIONS： The effect of the single ingredients of paste formulas for insomnia is to calm the mind， nourish the blood and soften the liver， enrich the qi and activate blood. The effects of paste formula combinations are mainly strengthening spleen， nourishing heart and settling mind. The characteristics of new formula are diversified， and the law of clearing liver， reducing fire， communicating heart and kidney， eliminating conduction and medium-to-hidden therapy are explored， which can provide reference for clinical treatment of insomnia.