Abstract: Drying can represent a critical process in both the industrial and daily life; It is often required to reduce the energy consumption during drying. Alternatively, solar drying can be expected to replace the traditional drying, due to the low carbon footprint and economic advantages. Among them, solar drying systems with the phase change materials (PCM) can also maintain the high drying efficiency, such as the simple structure and low cost. The operational time can also be significantly extended, compared with the solar-heat pump hybrid drying. Nevertheless, it is still lacking on the long-term continuous operation of these systems. In the present study, a numerical model was proposed for the PCM thermal storage unit in the drying chamber. The innovative concept of equivalent drying time was incorporated to facilitate the accurate prediction of drying curves under various operating conditions. A series of experiments were also carried out to validate the predictions. There was the close match between the prediction and measured data, with an average error of less than 5%. A dynamic simulation model of the PCM solar drying system was developed using the TRNSYS platform. The performance of system was evaluated at daily (a typical day of the summer solstice) and weekly (July 1 to July 8) time scales. The results indicate that the integrated PCM solar drying system was significantly enhanced the drying performance, compared with the traditional solar drying systems without thermal storage. Specifically, the average inlet temperature of the drying chamber increased by 10.34%, and the daily operating duration was extended by approximately three hours. Furthermore, the system was maintained a drying temperature above 35°C for 72.7% of the time during a continuous week of operation, with a daily average inlet temperature of 57.3°C. The nighttime inlet temperature reached 41.2°C under typical conditions. The duration above 35°C was accounted for 91.5%. The continuous drying was effectively achieved throughout the day. The simulation of performance was also performed on the typical days (spring and autumnal equinox). The significant improvements were found under the varying seasonal weather. The melting point of the PCM shared a considerable impact on the thermal stability of the system. The PCMs with the lower melting points demonstrated the superior thermal retention during nocturnal periods. There was a significant decrease in their temperature fluctuation coefficients, as the melting point decreased. The parameters were also optimized for the better performance of the system. A mechanistic model after numerical simulation was constructed to determine the dynamic patterns of PCM solar drying. Thereby, the finding can provide a theoretical foundation to enhance the energy efficiency. Rational selection of PCM and the optimization of thermal storage unit design can be expected to effectively solve the intermittency of solar resources towards all-weather operation. Furthermore, the heat transfer and thermal flow can be optimized for the high stability and drying efficiency. The finding can also provide the robust technical support for the scalable drying application of renewable energy.