Abstract: Nowadays, with the rapid development of the Internet, more and more new applications appear gradually, the scale of network expand constantly, and the architecture of network is more and more complicated. As one of the basic technologies for enhancing network controllability, traffic classification can not only provide better QoS for ISPs, but also supervise and manage network effectively, which can ensure the security of the Internet. In this paper we review the research methods and achievements in the field of traffic classification, compare these traditional methods, and point out their advantages and disadvantages. On the other hand, for the real challenges of real-time classification of high-speed network environment, encrypted traffic classification, fine-grained traffic classification, and dynamically changed protocols classification, we describe and analyze the related research progress. Finally, we look ahead the future research direction.