Abstract: As an important inorganic chemical raw materials,iodine plays a vital role in national economy,and is a scarce resource in the world at present.The distribution of iodine and present status of its industrial production were briefly introduced,and the advance in extraction of iodine was presented in detail.Then,the main methods of extracting iodine from brine and seaweed，such as cineration method,blow-out method,ion-exchange method,and activated carbon adsorption method,were introduced emphatically.And the advantages and disadvantages of these methods were compared.Futhermore,extraction method of iodine from flue gas in production of wet process phosphoric acid and  phosphoric fertilizer as well as some other new extrcation methods were also remarked.At last,the furture development direction of iodine extraction was prospected.