Abstract: China’s various territories, complex terrain and changing climate, results in frequent power line icing disaster, which is a serious threat to the normal national economic life. It is necessary to conduct in-depth study of ice coating of transmission line wires to ensure the safe and reliable operation of the power grid system. This paper firstly summarizes the relevant meteorological factors that cause the powerline icing, then enumerates some typical examples of empirical and semiempirical models of ice coating. The hydrodynamics and thermodynamics of the icing process are also described. The advantages and disadvantages of each model are compared and analyzed, and some recently developed statistical forecasting methods are briefly introduced. Finally the research status of domestic powerline icing prediction model is briefly reviewed.