According to different partitioning styles, there exist different impedance-based stability analysis methods for complex systems such as voltage source converter (VSC)-based high-voltage direct current (HVDC) systems. Thus, the determination of the partitioning method is of importance in impedance-based stability analysis. However, how to partition a complex system is not paid much attention in the past. In this paper, the partitioning problems are revisited and a set of practical partitioning principles are proposed. Based on the principles, the VSC-HVDC system is partitioned into five parts, satisfying simplicity and integrity. In addition, the methods to form the equivalent circuits of the sub-systems are given and the equivalent circuits of the sub-systems are built, which is helpful to obtain the input-output models of the sub-systems. Furthermore, a stability criterion by directly applying argument principle is used instead of the generalized Nyquist criterion (GNC), which could avoid the calculation of eigenvalue transfer functions, especially when a large number of sub-systems are involved. Finally, the correctness of the impedance-based stability analysis method is verified by control hardware-in-loop (CHIL) experimental results.