Background, aim, and scope The phenology of plants is sensitive to climate changes and is an indicator of several effects caused by environmental change. Variations in plants phenology not only reflect the evolution of the global environment, but also have important impacts on the earth material cycle and energy flow process. Previous studies have highlighted the inconsistency in the phenological response to climate change under diverse climate types. In addition, the key factors influencing the vegetation phenology varies with the regions. Generally, temperatures play a dominant role in controlling the plants phenology, however, other factors such as precipitation and light can also significantly alter the phenology in different regions. Therefore, combined with the background of plants growth, a comprehensive synthesis of factors affecting plant phenology is very necessary. Materials and methods In this paper, we did a literature review which comprise (1) the meteorological and territorial differences among diverse climate types as well as the regional characteristics of plants phenology under different climate types; (2) the phenological dynamics and dominant factors of plants phenology in four main kinds of climate types (tropical and subtropical climate, temperate climate, frigid climate and plateau mountain climate); (3) the discussion of the main problems of vegetation phenological studies and its prospect. This review is crucial to the research on the plants phenology variations under global change. Quantitative results and related contributions are summarized, and the unresolved issues for further study of the limitation in phenological research are discussed. Results The results showed that: (1) There were differences in spatial distribution of plants phenology in the world, and the latitudinal difference was found in the vegetation phenology. In the northern hemisphere in the high latitudes that is 40°N to the north of the area, the green-up date of vegetation from the south to the north showed a delayed trend. However, later occurrences of the leaf coloring were mainly detected in the southern hemisphere, such as southern Brazil, southern Australia and southern Africa. Additionally, chilling requirements for plants growth diverse under different climate types with higher value of chilling requirements mainly distributes over the maritime climate areas. (2) In tropical and subtropical climates, temperature, seasonal variation in rainfall, drought intensity and duration are important factors affecting plants phenology. (3) The temperature in winter and spring of the temperate climate zone as well as the accumulation of the chilling requirements have a strong impact on plant flowering phenology. Recent studies have highlighted the significant impacts of the daily maximum and minimum temperatures on plants spring phenology. Light intensity also significantly affects plant vegetative growth phenology and reproductive phenology. In addition, precipitation can also alter plants phenology to a certain extent in temperate climate zone. (4) The influencing factors of plants phenology change in the cold climate zone are mainly ice melting date and temperature. (5) The plants phenology of the plateau is mainly affected by temperature, and the temperature in winter and spring has the strongest effect on phenology. The melting time of snow also affects plants phenology to a certain extent. Discussion Our study revealed that the key factors affecting plants phenology under different climatic types were associated with the basic characteristics of the climate zone and plant functional type. For example, desert-tolerant plants are likely to be dominant in the tropical desert climate due to the little precipitation and high temperature.