Abstract: Bismuth phosphate with unique structure and properties has attracted much attention from chemical，physical，and material scientists in recent years.The research progress of preparation methods，including hydrothermal synthesis，solvothermal synthesis，and microwave synthesis of bismuth phosphate，was discussed.And then the applications，such as optical materials and environment purification，of bismuth phosphate were introduced.It was pointed out that developing low cost synthesis methods that can be enlarged easily and improving the performance by modification were the research directions of bismuth phosphate in the future.

Key words: bismuth phosphate, synthesis, application