Forest ecosystems are the main terrestrial ecosystems. It is the largest vegetation- and soil carbon pools, and its carbon fluxes and changes in carbon stocks have a decisive influence on the global carbon budget. Soil carbon plays an important role in global carbon cycle and carbon balance. Soil respiration is hot topic in the area of carbon cycle research. Soil respiration is a key link in the forest ecosystem carbon cycle, the output of the main ways of the forest ecosystem carbon to the atmosphere, important ecological processes of energy flow and material cycling in forest ecosystems, soil respiration has become a terrestrial ecosystem to the largest source of atmospheric emissions of CO_2, the system plays an important role in regional and global carbon cycle. With the intensification of global climate change, the role of forest soil respiration in the global carbon balance has aroused widespread concern. Scientific and effective way to strengthen the forest soil respiration determination of quantitative research have important significance for understanding the status of forest soil respiration in the global carbon cycle and carbon balance and forest soil carbon sequestration effect. This article illustrates the research advances of the forest soil respiration, a variety of measurement methods of soil respiration, compared the advantages and disadvantages of the static chamber method and dynamic chamber method, although the measurement of forest soil respiration deficiencies, but currently the best method is a dynamic infrared gas analysis method, one of the most reliable method, and elaborated the distinction of forest ecosystem components of soil respiration. Finally, we discuss the problems of forest ecosystems determination of soil respiration, and look determination of trends in soil respiration and further research directions.