As one of important components of diesel engines, the service conditions of piston is very severe and such atmosphere requires the pistons have special requirements for its materials. The development of aluminum alloys for pistons are summarized, including alloys (Al-Cu-Si, Al-Cu-Ni-Mg, eutectic Al-Si-Cu-Mg and hypereutectic Al-Si-Cu-Mg) and composite materials (SiC/Al composites, Al2O3/Al composites and TiC, TiB2/Al composites), the application of these materials are described. At the same time, failure mechanism of piston aluminum matrix composites are listed, including wear failure, mechanical damage and cracking at the top. According to the statistics of piston failure mechanism, the wear failure occupies a major position, which can be divided into adhesive wear and abrasive wear failure. This paper proposes improvement measures for the piston wear failure, such as material composition selection and preparation methods. In addition, when the diesel engine material works under its actual operating conditions containing sulfur and nitrogen and other corrosive atmosphere by the lubricating oil incomplete combustion, it will deteriorate the abrasion problems. But the reaction of enhanced phase and this complex corrosive atmosphere in the piston will generate self-lubrication film, which can reduce or even inhibit wear failure, thereby extending the life of diesel engine pistons.