Organic polymers have many advantages including light weight, easy molding, low cost, etc., and thus have wide applications in such fields as automobiles, electronics, and so on. However, most of their pristine surfaces usually tend to be chemically inert and have low surface energy. Thus, this limits their broad and practical applications. Laser surface modification technology has many excellent features of high flexibility, good local selection, and three-dimensional (3D) processing. In this paper, the progress of the property changes, mechanisms, and applications of organic polymers after laser surface modification was reviewed. It showed that laser modification was able to form such surface micro-morphologies as bumps, pits, grooves, micro-pores and periodic microstructures, and to markedly change surface chemical compositions, which affected their wettability, surface energy, adsorbability, color, and/or lubrication. This was mainly related to the self-properties of the organic polymer materials, and the laser modification parameters and environment. By adjusting the laser parameters, it was probable to precisely control the change of the above surface properties. Laser surface modification on organic polymers has great theoretical and practical application values. Nevertheless, the study of laser surface modification theory lagged behind that of practical application. It is necessary to further enhance the exploration and study on laser surface modification technology and mechanism.