As a semiconductor with direct band gap, β-FeSi2 is an ideal photoelectric material due to a large light absorption coefficient and a high theoretical photoelectric and thermoelectric conversion efficiency. The current status and application of β-FeSi2 were summarized firstly. Meanwhile, an effective method was proposed to avoid the bottleneck problem of β-FeSi2 single-phase such as difficult preparation and mismatch, which was the fabrication of Fe-Si amorphous thin films with similar properties of β-FeSi2 single-phase. In addition, local structure (short-range order) was the crucial factor for the properties of amorphous. Therefore, the systematic study on compositions, properties and local structure was important. On the basis of this, the relationship between compositions, properties and local structure of Fe-Si amorphous thin films analyzed and established according to experimental property zoning and cluster theory was illustrated under the guidance of "cluster-plus-glue-atom" model and measured results of properties. Simultaneously, the atomic occupancy of the additive element was revealed in amorphous and crystalline materials, and the influence of multi-component material design on the amorphous forming ability and semiconductor property was carefully discussed. These results indicated that introducing the "cluster-plus-glue-atom" model to explanation of local structure and the multi-component material design in Fe-Si amorphous thin film was an efficient approach. Through exact component design, the semiconductor property of the film can be adjusted in a wide component range, which provided a suitable cheap potential material for near-infrared detection and solar spectrum. Finally, the future research and application trends of Fe-Si amorphous thin film were proposed.