The concentration of Fe in aluminum alloy can affect the plasticity, heat resistance, strength and stress corrosion resistance of the alloy. The quantitative analysis of aluminum alloy composition is an important part of the online detection of alloy composition. To improve the quantitative analysis accuracy of Fe in aluminum alloy, the spatial confinement nanosecond laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy is combined with the gradient-descent method. By collecting laser-induced aluminum alloy plasma emission spectra, it is found that the plasma radiation intensity under the confinement of the plate space is significantly enhanced. The enhancement factor of the plasma emission spectrum with a plate spacing of 10 mm is 2.3. The internal standard method and the gradient descent method are used to establish the calibration models respectively, and the values of fitting coefficient (
R
2), root mean square error (RMSE) and average relative error (ARE) of the two models are compared. Without plate spatial confinement, the R
2, RMSEC, RMSEP and ARE of the Fe element calculated by the internal standard method are 90.66%, 0.1903%, 0.1910% and 9.2220%, respectively. The
R
2, RMSEC, RMSEP and ARE of Fe element obtained by the gradient descent method are 97.12%, 0.1467% (weight concentration), 0.1124% (weight concentration) and 7.1373%, respectively. With the plate spatial confinement, the
R
2, RMSEC, RMSEP and ARE of Fe element calculated by the internal standard method are 95.22%, 0.1409% (weight concentration), 0.1401% (weight concentration), and 6.8893%, respectively. The
R
2, RMSEC, RMSEP and ARE of Fe element obtained by the gradient descent method are 99.22%, 0.0731% (weight concentration), 0.0756% (weight concentration) and 3.5521%, respectively. Comparing with the internal calibration model, the accuracy and stability of the gradient descent calibration model are improved. The spatial confinement LIBS combined with the gradient descent method can effectively reduce the influence of the alloy matrix effect and the self-absorption effect on the quantitative analysis.