The invention discloses a method for manufacturing an asphalt mixture cylinder test piece with a side surface structure depth. The method comprises the following steps of (1) measuring the depth of a road surface structure; (2) manufacturing a substrate of which the surface is adhered with sand; (3) after an adhesive is solidified, bending the sand-adhered substrate, attaching the sand-adhered substrate to the inner side surface of a die which is in a hollow cylinder structure to form a cylindrical structure, and enabling the sand-adhered surface to face the inner side; and (4) forming the required asphalt mixture cylinder test piece with the side surface structure depth through the die with the sand-adhered substrate by adopting a compaction method, a static pressing method or a rotary compaction method. The method can form the asphalt mixture cylinder test piece with the certain side surface structure depth and meet a simulation experiment requirement; and therefore, when the side surface of the test piece is loaded by a rotating tire, a friction effect between a vehicle tire and an actual pavement can be almost achieved.