Abstract: Practice has found that the main reason for limiting the service life of the prosthesis and causing the patient's pain is that a large amount of wear debris generated during the use of the artificial joint enters the tissues around the joint, which promotes osteolysis and loosening of the prosthesis. Therefore, reducing the probability of osteolysis and prosthesis loosening is of great significance to increase the life of artificial joints and alleviate patient suffering. Wear is the main reason for the failure of joint materials. In order to prevent the occurrence of wear, it is necessary to improve the friction and wear performance of joint materials. Therefore, many researchers have conducted a large number of tests and improvement studies on the friction properties of artificial joint materials. We summarize the research results of improving the friction performance of artificial joint materials in recent years, introduces various artificial joint materials and their performance advantages and disadvantages, and summarizes the friction and wear performance of the materials themselves or materials after improved technology. In recent years, the research on surface modification of various joint materials has become a hot spot. For example, TiAlN coating can reduce the wear rate of titanium alloy by 80 % after acting on the surface of titanium alloy, and laser treatment can reduce the wear rate of PEEK by 90 %. In addition, new materials are also coming out, such as ULWPE, a new high-density polyethylene material with excellent performance after ultra-high molecular polyethylene. At the same time, as a carbon material with excellent biocompatibility and friction reduction, it has also attracted the attention of researchers and has gradually become the focus. At there review the development results of the friction properties of joint materials in recent years and provide directions for future research. Finally, it also puts forward the prospects for the development of artificial joints.