The focus of enterprises on innovation resources has shifted from endogenous to exogenous, and acquiring innovative resources from the external environment has become an important way to improve innovation performance. Based on the embedded theory and the new institutional theory, the relationship between network embedding and innovation performance is theoretically explored and empirically tested by means of confirmatory factor analysis and multi-level regression, and attempts to reveal the regulatory role of organizational legitimacy. The study finds that structural embedding can promote enterprise innovation performance more than relationship embedding; market legitimacy positively regulates the relationship between relationship embedding and innovation performance, and political legitimacy positively adjusts the relationship between structural embedding and innovation performance. While exploring new ways for enterprises to acquire innovative resources and improve innovation performance, this paper further perfects the embedded theory and new institutional theory to provide reference for subsequent research.