Abstract: Alkylation of toluene and methanol is a new technological process to prepare p-xylene.Due to its low price of raw materials， high-selectivity of p-xylene，and easy separation of products，researchers pay high attention to this new process.Catalyst with high activity，high selectivity，and good stability is the key technology of selective alkylation.Research progress in preparation methods，such as hydrothermal treatment method，immersion method，and carbon pre-depositing method，of catalysts for selective alkylation of toluene and methanol was summarized.It was pointed out that the water vapor modification could increase the catalyst′s life and the immersion method′s operation was simple and its reproducibility was good，therefore，they were the conventional methods for molecular sieve modification at present.It had not been a difficult problem to prepare high selective catalyst for alkylation of toluene and methanol through the modification of molecular sieve.On the basis of maintaining high activity and selectivity，increasing the stability of the catalyst and making it have industrial application value will be the future research focus for the selective alkylation of toluene and methanol.

Key words: toluene, methanol, alkylation, p-xylene