Abstract: It is well known that sediment research in China has got a great achievements since the past fifty years. What are its role, status and development are presented in this paper first. Then the main achievements are introduced on four aspects: theory of non-equilibrium transport of sediment, hyperconcentrated flow, engineering sediment, and river evolution and regulation management. Finally, main directions of sediment research are discussed on the fundamental study, the basin numerical modelling, the sediment depostion simulation over long time, and the coastal sediment dynamics.