[Objective] The comprehensive benefits of desert highway sand control engineering were evaluated in order to provide a scientific reference for research to evaluate sand control engineering of highways in wind-blown sand areas, and for subsequent work with respect to operation and maintenance. [Methods] The sand control engineering of desert section of the Wuhai-Maqin Highway was taking as a case study, based on an analysis of the influencing factors of the comprehensive benefits of desert highway sand control projects, a comprehensive benefits evaluation indicator system for highway sand control engineering was constructed from three aspects:engineering benefits, economic benefits, and environmental benefits. A matter-element extension model with variable weight was constructed. Fixed weights were then corrected using variable-weighting theory to reflect the effect of fluctuations in indicator values on indicator weights. The indicators that had a significant impact on the comprehensive benefits were also identified through sensitivity analysis. Finally, the model was applied to sand control engineering in the desert section of the Wuhai-Maqin highway. [Results] The comprehensive benefits of sand control engineering in the desert section of the Wuhai-Maqin highway were in the "relatively good" benefit level, but they strongly trended towards the "medium" benefit level. Compared with the traditional fixed-weight method, the benefits were more in line with engineering reality. Among the many indicators, the protective effect, breakage degree, construction quality, and effects of vegetation environment had the most significant impacts on the evaluation results. [Conclusion] To further improve the comprehensive benefit level of sand control projects in the desert section of the Wuhai-Maqin highway, the changing trend of these indicators should be focused on in the later stages of operation and maintenance, and maintenance work should be targeted to ensure maximum comprehensive benefits.