The research and development of advanced agricultural machinery equipment in hilly and mountainous areas is one of the hot and difficult problems in the development of agricultural machinery equipment in China. At present, the agricultural production in hilly and mountainous areas still has the practical problem of “no available machinery, no good machinery”, and the research and development of advanced suitable agricultural equipment lacks the necessary theoretical support. The research status of hillside agricultural machinery equipment at home and abroad, especially hillside tractor, hillside agricultural machinery leveling technology, hillside tractor driving and power system, hillside machinery and tools and their operating performance were summarized, and the research progress of soil compaction and soil tillage erosion in slope operation by agricultural machinery was analyzed. The advanced computer aided methods for the design of hillside agricultural machinery and the study of the interaction mechanism between hillside agricultural machinery and soil were summarized. Finally, the research focus and development direction of agricultural machinery equipment and slope operation technology in hilly and mountainous areas were prospected as follows: the interaction mechanism between agricultural machinery and slope soil and crop (nutrient); the overall design of hillside agricultural machinery deeply integrated with agronomy and slope operation scene; efficient and reliable attitude adjustment mechanism and control strategy of hillside machinery; hillside farm machinery efficient transmission and easy steering drive; and intelligent monitoring and accurate autonomous navigation of mountain farm machinery operation. This review can provide reference for efficient and high quality production of agriculture in hilly and mountainous areas.