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The new generation of the district heating system (DHS) has attracted much attention due to its high efficiency. A precise and fast dynamic simulation is the foundation of the optimization and control strategy of a DHS. As a type of heterogeneous system, the DHS has internal components with multiple time scales, which limits accuracy of simulations. However, current studies have either chosen pseudo-dynamic models or have not considered the effect of the internal time scale on the simulation. To solve above problems, a dynamic multi-rate simulation method based on the individual-based model (IBM) is proposed in this paper. According to IBM, a complex system is decoupled into individuals, who interact with each other to form the whole system from bottom-up. During the process of modeling, equations of individuals indicating their dynamic behaviors are all converted into a system of ordinary differential equations (ODEs). And then the ODEs are solved from system level using multi-rate simulation methods. The case study illustrates that the proposed method takes 36.59 s for the 72 h long-term simulation of the DHS containing three components commonly involved and a district heating network, which provides good decision-making information for the optimal control of the system. • Individual-based multi-rate dynamic analysis method for heterogeneous systems. • Abstraction-based programming framework for IBM dynamic simulation. • Short-term simulation verification of a real DHN and long-term dynamic behavior analysis of a virtual DHS. • Compared with the forward Euler method, the proposed method is accurate and fast. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]