Abstract: A strong coordination mechanism is the institutional safeguard of the development of voluntary service. Based on the analysis of three local coordination mechanism patterns of volunteering in China, the paper argues that the optimal choice of coordination mechanism for voluntary service is creating a coordination mechanism for volunteering which integrates the inter-departmental committee pattern and the Volunteers Association pattern. The direction of Optimizing coordination mechanism for voluntary service is transforming the Volunteer Association from the government selection pattern into the social selection pattern.