This paper summarizes three mechanisms of laser-induced surface colorization:nanosecond laser induced oxide layer, which is characterized by low cost and mature industrial application; periodic structures induced by direct laser-writing or by direct laser interference pattern, which enriches the categories of periodic structure and greatly improves the coloring efficiency, making it more suitable for industrial applications; laser induced plasmonic metal nanostructures, which can tune the color of a single nanostructure by adjusting the size and spacing of nanostructures, so that ultra-high resolution color patterns with nanoscale pixel size can be printed. The application of laser-induced surface colorization in anti-counterfeiting, steganography and color hologram is also introduced. As the repeatability and stability of laser-induced surface colorization is a critical issue for its application, therefore further investigation should focus on the theoretical study, so as to improve the consistency of the theoretical and actual results, and optimize the process to establish the quantitative relation of the input and output parameters, thus enhancing coloring effect and processing efficiency.