During the past decades, due to the intensified human disturbance and its special geological background and ecological environment, karst ecosystem in the southwestern part of China exhibited significant vulnerability, which hinders the sustainable development of the social-economic-ecological system of the region. Based on system sensitivity and adaptability, a large number of studies have investigated the vulnerability of karst ecosystem structure, function, and habitat to external disturbance. Especially, indicators of ecosystem diversity, key species, productivity, and soil physical/chemical properties were applied to reveal ecosystem sensitivity to land use/cover change and rocky desertification. However, research on quantification of ecosystem sensitivity by field experiment, mechanism models, and mathematical statistics, is less advanced. Although some karst- suitable plants present adaptability to karst drought environment by self- regulation of morphological structure and physiological function, the ecosystem adaption mechanism or biophysical/biochemical processes in response to environmental threat (e.g. human disturbance and climate change) remain unclear. Due to the close interaction of ecosystem structure, function, and habitat, future research should examine the response of coupled ecosystem components to promote the study of driving mechanism and quantitative assessment of karst ecosystem vulnerability. Furthermore, research on ecosystem vulnerability at different succession stages of karst rocky desertification needs to be strengthened to advance rocky desertification control and ecological restoration and reconstruction.