With the increasing density of seismic stations and the rapid development of earthquake detection methods,microseismic research has received extensive attention from the seismology community. Compared with strong earthquakes with longer recurrence period,small earthquakes,however,have a shorter recurrence period and a higher occurrence frequency,which can be used to obtain higher resolution information on changes in the physical properties and stress state of the crust. Small earthquakes have a wide application in many seismological studies,such as the fault geometry,the relationship between foreshocks and earthquake nucleation,the spatial-temporal evolution characteristics and triggering mechanism of aftershocks,remote dynamic triggering,repeating earthquakes,induced seismicity,and detection of non-volcanic tremors,etc. High-precision earthquake location results can reveal the precise fault geometry and the fault activity process,and therefore promote our further understanding for fault characteristics and earthquake physical process. In this paper,we briefly review some important advance in recent microseismic research,including major methods of earthquake detection and case studies of microseismicity in many fields. Lastly,we make some prospects on microseismic applications in earthquake science.