Objective To review retinitis pigmentosa (RP)-related gene researches in China. Methods RP genes and RP gene therapy as key words were searched from those online databases including China Knowledge Resource Integrated Database of China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), Human Gene Mutation Database (HGMD), and Human Genome Variation Society (HGVS). Related papers written by authors from China or other countries,published from 1991 to 2011 were collected for analysis. Results Overall 60 RP-related genes have been identified now. Chinese researchers from 29 hospitals and research institutes confirmed 17 RP-related gene changes (239 mutations, 131 of them are pathogenic) in 300 RP families and 1572 sporadic RP patients from 1991 to 2011, as reported in 66 papers. Mutations in rhodopsin (RHO) gene, NR2E3 gene and RP1 gene were found in 2.0％, 2.9％ and 1.0％ of Chinese RP patients respectively. The relationship between genotypes and clinical phenotypes were investigated in 15 papers, including RHO gene, RDS gene, RP1 and RPGR or RP3 gene in ADRP families. Gene therapy for RP has been investigated in 4 papers. Seven hundred and eighteen papers about RP gene-mutation screening have been published from other countries,and more than 2000 variants were identified which including 352 disease-causing mutations. Mutations of RHO gene, RDS and RP1 were found in 25％-50％, 8％ and 5％-10％ of ADRP patients in Caucasian populations. RPGR mutations were found in 70％-80％ of XLRP patients in Caucasian populations, and 50％-60％ of mutations are identified in open reading frame (ORF) 15. Totally 391 papers about gene therapy for RP have been published. Conclusions Seventeen RP-related genes have been studied and 131pathogenic mutations were found in China. Considering Chinese population, our RP research is still behind other countries.