Water vapor is a vital basis of water and energy cycles and varies with space and time. When researching the variations of moisture in the atmosphere, it is intuitive to think about the total water vapor of the atmosphere column, precipitable water. It is an element that needs high-altitude observations. A surface quantity, surface water vapor pressure, has a close relationship to precipitable water because of the internal physical linkage between them. The stability of their linkage at climatic scales is verified in this work, while studies before mainly concentrated on daily and annual cycles. The consistency of their variations is checked with three reanalysis datasets from three angles, including the interannual variations, the long-term trends, and the first EOF modes. Results show that the interannual correlation of surface water vapor pressure and precipitable water can reach a quite high level in most areas, and the weak correlation regions mainly exist in low-latitude areas. The long-term trends, as well as the first EOF modes of these two quantities also show that their variations are well consistent, but specific differences appear in some regions, and there are discrepancies among different datasets. With the correspondence of precipitable water and surface water vapor pressure, the variations of total column water vapor can be indicated by the surface quantity, surface water vapor pressure. The correspondence is also meaningful for the analysis of the co-variation of total column vapor and temperature. For example, we could research the relations between surface vapor pressure and air temperature, and it can reflect the co-variance of total column vapor and near-surface air temperature. Linking the column integrated moisture content to surface temperature directly or integrating the column temperature can be avoided.